author: Mr. Justice Rehnquist Mr. Justice Marshall,

text:
    UNITED STATES v. SALVUCCI et al.
    No. 79-244.
    Argued March 26, 1980
    Decided June 25, 1980

      Rehkquist, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which Burger, C. J., and Stewart, White, Blackmun, Powell, and SteveNS, JJ., joined. Marshall, J., filed a dissenting opinion, in which BreNNAN, J., joined, post, p. 95.

      Mark I. Levy argued the cause for the United States. With him on the briefs were Solicitor General McCree, Assistant Attorney General Heymann, and Deputy Solicitor General Frey.

      Willie J. Davis, by appointment of the Court, 444 U. S. 1067, argued the cause and filed a brief for respondent Sal-vucci. John C. McBride, by appointment of the Court, 444 U. S. 1067, argued the cause and filed a brief for respondent Zackular.
   Mr. Justice Rehnquist

delivered the opinion of the Court. Relying on Jones v. United States, 362 U. S. 257 (1960), the Court of Appeals for the First Circuit held that since respondents were charged with crimes of possession, they were entitled to claim “automatic standing” to challenge the legality of the search which produced the evidence against them, without regard to whether they had an expectation of privacy in the premises searched. 599 F. 2d 1094 (1979). Today we hold that defendants charged with crimes of possession may only claim the benefits of the exclusionary rule if their own Fourth Amendment rights have in fact been violated. The automatic standing, rule of Jones v. United States, supra, is therefore overruled.

I

Respondents, John Salvueci and Joseph Zaekular, were charged in a federal indictment with 12 counts of unlawful possession of stolen mail, in violation of 18 TJ. S. C. § 1708. The 12 checks which formed the basis of the indictment had been seized by the Massachusetts police during the search of an apartment rented by respondent Zackular’s mother. The search was conducted pursuant to a warrant.

Respondents filed a motion to suppress the checks on the ground that the affidavit supporting the application for the search warrant was inadequate to demonstrate probable cause. The District Court granted respondents’ motions and ordered that the checks be suppressed. The Government sought reconsideration of the District Court’s ruling, contending that respondents lacked “standing” to challenge the constitutionality of the search. The District Court reaffirmed its suppression order and the Government appealed.

The Court of Appeals affirmed, holding that respondents had “standing” and the search warrant was constitutionally inadequate. The court found that the respondents were not required to establish a legitimate expectation of privacy in the premises searched or the property seized because they were entitled to assert “automatic standing” to object to the search and seizure under Jones v. United States, supra. The court observed that the vitality of the Jones doctrine had been challenged in recent years, but that “[u]ntil the Supreme Court rules on this question, we are not prepared to hold that the automatic standing rule of Jones has been . . . overruled. . . . That is an issue which the Supreme Court must resolve.” 599 F. 2d, at 1098. The Court of Appeals was obviously correct in its characterization of the status of Jones, and we granted certiorari in order to resolve the controversy. 444 U. S. 989 (1979).

II

As early as 1907, this Court took the position that remedies for violations of constitutional rights would only be afforded to a person who “belongs to the class for whose sake the constitutional protection is given.” Hatch v. Reardon, 204 U. S. 152, 160. The exclusionary rule is one form of remedy afforded for Fourth Amendment violations, and the Court in Jones v. United States held that the Hatch v. Reardon principle properly limited its availability. The Court reasoned that ordinarily “it is entirely proper to require of one who seeks to challenge the legality of a search as the basis for suppressing relevant evidence that he . . . establish, that he himself was the victim of an invasion of privacy.” 362 U. S., at 261. Subsequent attempts to vicariously assert violations of the Fourth Amendment rights of others have been repeatedly rejected by this Court. Alderman v. United States, 394 U. S. 165, 174 (1969); Brown v. United States, 411 U. S. 223, 230 (1973). Most recently, in Rakas v. Illinois, 439 U. S. 128 (1978), we held that “it is proper to permit only defendants whose Fourth Amendment rights have been violated to benefit from the [exclusionary] rule’s protections.” Id., at 134.

Even though the Court in Jones recognized that the exclusionary rule should only be available to protect defendants who have been the victims of an illegal search or seizure, the Court thought it necessary to establish an exception. In cases where possession of the seized evidence was an essential element of the offense charged, the Court held that the defendant was not obligated to establish that his own Fourth Amendment rights had been violated, but only that the search and seizure of the evidence was unconstitutional. Upon such a showing, the exclusionary rule would be available to prevent the admission of the evidence against the defendant.

The Court found that the prosecution of such possessory offenses presented a “special problem” which necessitated the departure from the then settled principles of Fourth Amendment “standing.” Two circumstances were found to require this exception. First, the Court found that in order to establish standing at a hearing on a motion to suppress, the defendant would often be “forced to allege facts the proof of which would tend, if indeed not be sufficient, to convict him,” since several Courts of Appeals had “pinioned a defendant within this dilemma” by holding that evidence adduced at the motion to suppress could be used against the defendant at trial. 362 U. S., at 262. The Court declined to embrace any rule which would require a defendant to assert his Fourth Amendment claims only at the risk of providing the prosecution with self-incriminating statements admissible at trial. The Court sought resolution of this dilemma by relieving the defendant of the obligation of establishing that his Fourth Amendment rights were violated by an illegal search or seizure.

The Court also commented that this rule would be beneficial for a second reason. Without a rule prohibiting a Government challenge to a defendant’s “standing” to invoke the exclusionary rule in a possessory offense prosecution, the Government would be allowed the “advantage of contradictory positions.” Id., at 263. The Court reasoned that the Government ought not to be allowed to assert that the defendant possessed the goods for purposes of criminal liability, while simultaneously asserting that he did not possess them for the purposes of claiming the protections of the Fourth Amendment. The Court found that “[i]t is not consonant with the amenities, to put it mildly, of the administration of criminal justice to sanction such squarely contradictory assertions of power by the Government.” Id., at 263-264. Thus in order to prevent both the risk that self-incrimination would attach to the assertion of Fourth Amendment rights, as well as to prevent the “vice of prosecutorial self-contradiction,” see Brown v. United States, supra, at 229, the Court adopted the rule of “automatic standing.”

In the 20 years which have lapsed since the Court’s decision in Jones, the two reasons which led the Court to the rule of automatic standing have likewise been affected 'by time. This Court has held that testimony given by a defendant in support of a motion to suppress cannot be admitted as evi-denee of his guilt at trial. Simmons v. United States, 390 U. S. 377 (1968). Developments in the principles of Fourth Amendment standing, as well, clarify that a prosecutor may, with legal consistency and legitimacy, assert that a defendant charged with possession of a seized item did not have a privacy interest violated in the course of the search and seizure. We are convinced not only that the original tenets of the Jones decision have eroded, but also that no alternative principles exist to support retention of the rule.

A

The “dilemma” identified in Jones, that a defendant charged with a possessory offense might only be able to establish his standing to challenge a search and seizure by giving self-incriminating testimony admissible as evidence of his guilt, was eliminated by our decision in Simmons v. United States, supra. In Simmons, the defendant Garrett was charged with bank robbery. During the search of a codefendant's mother’s house, physical evidence used in the bank robbery, including a suitcase, was found in the basement and seized. In an effort to establish his standing to assert the illegality of the search, Garrett testified at the suppression hearing that the suitcase was similar to one he owned and that he was the owner of the clothing discovered inside the suitcase. Garrett’s motion to suppress was denied, but his testimony was admitted into evidence against him as part of the Government’s case-in-chief at trial. This Court reversed, finding that “a defendant who knows that his testimony may be admissible against him at trial will sometimes be deterred from presenting the testimonial proof of standing necessary to assert a Fourth Amendment claim.” 390 U. S., at 392-393. The Court found that, in effect, the defendant was

“obliged either to give up what he believed, with advice of counsel, to be a valid Fourth Amendment claim or, in legal effect, to waive his Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination. In these circumstances, we find it intolerable that one constitutional right should have to be surrendered in order to assert another. We therefore hold that when a defendant testifies in support of a motion to suppress evidence on Fourth Amendment grounds, his testimony may not thereafter be admitted against him at trial on the issue of guilt unless he makes no objection.” Id., at 394.

This Court’s ruling in Simmons thus not only extends protection against this risk of self-incrimination in all of the cases covered by Jones, but also grants a form of “use immunity” to those defendants charged with nonpossessory crimes. In this respect, the protection of Simmons is therefore broader than that of Jones. Thus, as we stated in Brown v. United States, 411 U. S., at 228, “[t]he self-incrimination dilemma, so central to the Jones decision, can no longer occur under the prevailing interpretation of the Constitution [in Simmons].”

B

This Court has identified the self-incrimination rationale as the cornerstone of the Jones opinion. See Brown v. United States, supra, at 228. We need not belabor the question of whether the “vice” of prosecutorial contradiction could alone support a rule countenancing the exclusion of probative evidence on the grounds that someone other than the defendant was denied a Fourth Amendment right. The simple answer is that the decisions of this Court, especially our most recent decision in Rakas v. Illinois, 439 U. S. 128 (1978), clearly establish that a prosecutor may simultaneously maintain that a defendant criminally possessed the seized good, but was not subject to a Fourth Amendment deprivation, without legal contradiction. To conclude that a prosecutor engaged in self-contradiction in Jones, the Court necessarily relied on the unexamined assumption that a defendant’s possession of a seized good sufficient to establish criminal culpability was also sufficient to establish Fourth Amendment “standing.” This assumption, however, even if correct at the time, is no longer so.

The person in legal possession of a good seized during an illegal search has not necessarily been subject to a Fourth Amendment deprivation. As we hold today in Rawlings v. Kentucky, post, p. 98, legal possession of a seized good is not a proxy for determining whether the owner had a Fourth Amendment interest, for it does not invariably represent the protected Fourth Amendment interest. This Court has repeatedly repudiated the notion that “arcane distinctions developed in property and tort law” ought to control our Fourth Amendment inquiry. Rakas v. Illinois, supra, at 143. In another section of the opinion in Jones itself, the Court concluded that, “it is unnecessary and ill-advised to import into the law surrounding the constitutional right to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures subtle distinctions, developed and refined by the common law in evolving the body of private property law. . . .” 362 U. S., at 266. See also Mancusi v. DeForte, 392 U. S. 364 (1968); Warden v. Hayden, 387 U. S. 294 (1967).

While property ownership is clearly a factor to be considered in determining whether an individual’s Fourth Amendment rights have been violated, see Rakas, supra, at 144, n. 12, property rights are neither the beginning nor the end of this Court’s inquiry. In Rakas, this Court held that an illegal search only violates the rights of those who have “a legitimate expectation of privacy in the invaded place.” 439 U. S., at 140. See also Mancusi v. DeForte, supra.

We simply decline to use possession of a seized good as a substitute for a factual finding that the owner of the good had a legitimate expectation of privacy in the area searched. In Jones, the Court held not only that automatic standing should be conferred on defendants charged with crimes of possession, but, alternatively, that Jones had actual standing because he was “legitimately on the premises” at the time of the search. In Rakas, this Court rejected the adequacy of this second Jones standard, finding that it was “too broad a gauge for measurement of Fourth Amendment rights.” 439 IJ. S., at 142. In language appropriate to our consideration of the automatic standing rule as well, we reasoned:

“In abandoning 'legitimately on premises’ for the doctrine that we announce today, we are not forsaking a time-tested and workable rule, which has produced consistent results when applied, solely for the sake of fidelity to the values underlying the Fourth Amendment. Rather, we are rejecting blind adherence to a phrase which at most has superficial clarity and which conceals underneath that thin veneer all of the problems of line drawing which must be faced in any conscientious effort to apply the Fourth Amendment. Where the factual premises for a rule are so generally prevalent that little would be lost and much would be gained by abandoning case-by-case analysis, we have not hesitated to do so. .. . We would not wish to be understood as saying that legitimate presence on the premises is irrelevant to one’s expectation of privacy, but it cannot be deemed controlling.” Id., at 147-148.

As in Rakas, we again reject “blind adherence” to the other underlying assumption in Jones that possession of the seized good is an acceptable measure of Fourth Amendment interests. As in Rakas, we find that the Jones standard “creates too broad a gauge for measurement of Fourth Amendment rights” and that we must instead engage in a “conscientious effort to apply the Fourth Amendment” by asking not merely whether the defendant had a possessory interest in the items seized, but whether he had an expectation of privacy in the area searched. Thus neither prosecutorial “vice,” nor the underlying assumption of Jones that possession of a seized good is the equivalent of Fourth Amendment “standing” to challenge the search, can save the automatic standing rule.

C

Even though the original foundations of Jones are no longer relevant, respondents assert that principles not articulated by the Court in Jones support retention of the rule. First, respondents maintain that while Simmons v. United States, 390 U. S. 377 (1968), eliminated the possibility that the prosecutor could use a defendant's testimony at a suppression hearing as substantive evidence of guilt at trial, Simmons did not eliminate other risks to the defendant which attach to giving testimony on a motion to suppress. Principally, respondents assert that the prosecutor may still be permitted to use the defendant’s testimony to impeach him at trial. This Court has not decided whether Simmons precludes the use of a defendant’s testimony at a suppression hearing to impeach his testimony at trial. But the issue presented here is quite different from the one of whether “use immunity” extends only through the Government’s case-in-chief, or beyond that to the direct and cross-examination of a defendant in the event he chooses to take the stand. That issue need not be and is not resolved here, for it is an issue which more aptly relates to the proper breadth of the Simmons privilege, and not to the need for retaining automatic standing.

Respondents also seek to retain the Jones rule on the grounds that it is said to maximize the deterrence of illegal police conduct by permitting an expanded class of potential challengers. The same argument has been rejected by this Court as a sufficient basis for allowing persons whose Fourth Amendment rights were not violated to nevertheless claim the benefits of the exclusionary rule. In Alderman v. United States, 394 U. S., at 174-175, we explicitly stated:

“The deterrent values of preventing the incrimination of those whose rights the police have violated have been considered sufficient to justify the suppression of probative evidence even though the case against the defendant is weakened or destroyed. We adhere to that judgment. But we are not convinced that the additional benefits of extending the exclusionary rule to other defendants would justify further encroachment upon the public interest in prosecuting those accused of crime and having them acquitted or convicted on the basis of all the evidence which exposes the truth.”

See also Rakas v. Illinois, 439 U. S., at 137; United States v. Ceccolini, 435 U. S. 268, 275-276 (1978); United States v. Calandra, 414 U. S. 338, 350-351 (1974). Respondents’ deterrence argument carries no special force in the context of possessory offenses and we therefore again reject it.

We are convinced that the automatic standing rule of Jones has outlived its usefulness in this Court’s Fourth Amendment jurisprudence. The doctrine now serves only to afford a windfall to defendants whose Fourth Amendment rights have not been violated. We are unwilling to tolerate the exclusion of probative evidence under such circumstances since we adhere to the view of Alderman that the values of the Fourth Amendment are preserved by a rule which limits the availability of the exclusionary rule to defendants who have been subjected to a violation of their Fourth Amendment rights.

This action comes to us as a challenge to a pretrial decision suppressing evidence. The respondents relied on automatic standing and did not attempt to establish that they had a legitimate expectation of privacy in the areas of Zackular’s mother’s home where the goods were seized. We therefore think it appropriate to remand so that respondents will have an opportunity to demonstrate, if they can, that their own Fourth Amendment rights were violated. See Combs v. United States, 408 U. S. 224 (1972).

Reversed and remanded.

Mr. Justice Marshall,

with whom Mr. Justice Brennan joins, dissenting.

Today the Court overrules the “automatic standing” rule of Jones v. United States, 362 U. S. 257 (1960), because it concludes that the rationale underpinning the rule has been “eroded,” ante, at 89. I do not share that view.

A defendant charged with a possessory offense who moves to suppress the items he is charged with possessing must now establish at the suppression hearing that the police conduct of which he complains violated his personal Fourth Amendment rights. In many cases, a defendant will be able to make the required showing only by taking the stand and testifying about his interest in the place searched and the evidence seized; the need for the defendant’s own testimony may, in fact, be more likely to arise in possession cases than in cases involving other types of offenses. The holding in Jones was premised, in part, on the unfairness of “pinion [ing] a defendant within th[e] dilemma,” 362 U. S., at 262, of being able to assert his Fourth Amendment claim only by relinquishing his Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination. The Court finds that this dilemma no longer exists because Simmons v. United States, 390 U. S. 377 (1968), held that testimony given by a defendant in support of a motion to suppress “may not thereafter be admitted against him at trial on the issue of guilt unless he makes no objection.” Id., at 394.

I cannot agree that Simmons provides complete protection against the “self-incrimination dilemma,” Brown v. United States, 411 U. S. 223, 228 (1973). Respondents contend that the testimony given at the suppression hearing might be held admissible for impeachment purposes and, while acknowledging that that question is not before us in this case, the majority broadly hints that this is so. Ante, at 94, n. 9; see Harris v. New York, 401 U. S. 222 (1971); United States v. Kahan, 415 U. S. 239 (1974); United States v. Havens, 446 U. S. 620 (1980); Jenkins v. Anderson, 447 U. S. 231 (1980); but see New Jersey v. Portash, 440 U. S. 450 (1979). The use of the testimony for impeachment purposes would subject a defendant to precisely the same dilemma, unless he was prepared to relinquish his constitutional right to testify in his own defense, and would thereby create a strong deterrent to asserting Fourth Amendment claims. One of the purposes of Jones and Simmons was to remove such obstacles. See Simmons, supra, at 392-394. Moreover, the opportunity for cross-examination at the suppression hearing may enable the prosecutor to elicit incriminating information beyond that offered on direct examination to establish the requisite Fourth Amendment interest. Even if such information could not be introduced at the subsequent trial, it might be helpful to the prosecution in developing its case or deciding its trial strategy. The furnishing of such a tactical advantage to the prosecution should not be the price of asserting a Fourth Amendment claim. Simmons, therefore, does not eliminate the possibility that a defendant will be deterred from presenting a Fourth Amendment claim because of “the risk that the words which he utters may later be used to incriminate him.” Simmons, supra, at 393. Accordingly, I conclude that this part of the reasoning in Jones remains viable.

A second ground for relieving the defendant charged with possession from the necessity of showing “an interest in the premises searched or the property seized” was that “to hold to the contrary . . . would be to permit the Government to have the advantage of contradictory positions as a basis for conviction,” Jones, 362 U. S., at 263. That is, since “possession both convicts and confers standing,” ibid., the Government, which had charged the defendant with possession, would not be permitted to deny that he had standing. By holding today in Rawlings v. Kentucky, post, p. 98, that a person may assert a Fourth Amendment claim only if he has a privacy interest in the area that was searched, the Court has, to be sure, done away with that logical inconsistency. For reasons stated in my dissenting opinion in that case, I believe that holding is diametrically opposed to the meaning of the Fourth Amendment as it has always been understood.

In sum, I find neither of the Court’s grounds for abandoning Jones persuasive. The automatic standing rule is a salutary one which protects the rights of defendants and eliminates the wasteful requirement of making a preliminary showing of standing in pretrial proceedings involving pos-sessory offenses, where the charge itself alleges an interest sufficient to support a Fourth Amendment claim. I dissent.

       The District Court held that the affidavit was deficient because the affiant relied on double hearsay, and failed to specify the dates on which information included in the affidavit had been obtained.

       The Courts of Appeals have divided on the continued applicability of the automatic standing rule. The Sixth Circuit abandoned the rule after our decision in Simmons v. United States, 390 U. S. 377 (1968). See, e. g., United States v. Hunter, 550 F. 2d 1066 (1977). Most of the remaining Circuits appear to have retained the rule, but many with “misgivings.” See, e. g., United States v. Oates, 560 F. 2d 45, 52 (CA2 1977) ; United States v. Edwards, 577 F. 2d 883, 892 (CA5), cert. denied, 439 U. S. 968 (1978).

       In Brown v. United States, 411 U. S. 223, 229 (1973), this Court clarified that the automatic standing rule of Jones was applicable only where the offense charged “possession of the seized evidence at the time of the contested search and seizure.”

       In Rakas, this Court discarded reliance on concepts of “standing” in determining whether a defendant is entitled to claim the protections of the exclusionary rule. The inquiry, after Rakas, is simply whether the defendant’s rights were violated by the allegedly illegal search or seizure. Because Jones was decided at a time when “standing” was designated as a separate inquiry, we use that term for the purposes of re-examining that opinion.

       Respondent Salvncei cites this Court’s decision in United States v. Jeffers, 342 U. S. 48 (1951), as support for the view that legal ownership of the seized good was sufficient to confer Fourth Amendment “standing.” In Rakas, however, we stated that “[s]tanding in Jeffers was based on Jeffers’ possessory interest in both the premises searched and the property seized.” 439 U. S., at 136. (Emphasis added.)

       Legal possession of the seized good may be sufficient in some circumstances to entitle a defendant to seek the return of the seized property if the seizure, as opposed to the search, was illegal. See, e. g., United States v. Lisk, 522 F. 2d 228 (CA7 1975) (Stevens, J.), cert. denied, 423 U. S. 1078 (1976), although in that case the property was ultimately found not to have been illegally seized. We need not explore this issue since respondents did not challenge the constitutionality of the seizure of the evidence.

       The respondents argue that the prosecutor’s access to the suppression testimony will unfairly provide the prosecutor with information advantageous to the preparation of his ease and trial strategy. This argument, however, is surely applicable equally to possessory and nonpossessory offenses. This Court has clearly declined to expand the Jones rule to other classes of offenses, Alderman v. United States, 394 U. S. 165 (1969); Brown v. United States, 411 U. S. 223 (1973), and thus respondents’ rationale cannot support the retention of a special rule of automatic standing here.

       A number of courts considering the question have held that such testimony is admissible as evidence of impeachment. Gray v. State, 43 Md. App. 238, 403 A. 2d 853 (1979); People v. Douglas, 66 Cal. App. 3d 998, 136 Cal. Rptr. 358 (1977); People v. Sturgis, 58 Ill. 2d 211, 317 N. E. 2d 545 (1974). See also Woody v. United States, 126 U. S. App. D. C. 353, 354-355, 379 F, 2d 130, 131-132 (Burger, J.), cert. denied, 389 U. S. 961 (1967).

       This Court has held that “the protective shield of Simmons is not to be converted into a license for false representations. . . United States v. Kahan, 415 U. S. 239, 243 (1974).


source: Caselaw Access Project

author: Mr. Justice Rehnquist Me. Justice Blackmun, Mr. Justice White, Me. Justice Marshall,

license: Public Domain

text:
    RAWLINGS v. KENTUCKY
    No. 79-5146.
    Argued March 26, 1980
    Decided June 25, 1980

      Rehnquist, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which Burger, C. J., and Blackmun, Powell, and Stevens, JJ., joined, and in Parts I and II-A of which Stewart and White, JJ., joined. Blackmun, J., filed a concurring opinion, post, p. 111. White, J., filed an opinion concurring in part, in which Stewart, J., joined, post, p. 113. Marshall, J., filed a dissenting opinion, in which Brennan, J., joined, post, p. 114.

      J. Vincent Aprile II argued the cause and filed briefs for petitioner.

      Victor Fox, Assistant Attorney General of Kentucky, argued the cause for respondent. With him on the brief were iSteven L. Beshear, Attorney General, and Gerald Henry and Patrick B. Kimberlin III, Assistant Attorneys General.
   Mr. Justice Rehnquist

delivered the opinion of the Court.

Petitioner David Rawlings was convicted by the Commonwealth of Kentucky on charges of trafficking in, and possession of, various controlled substances. Throughout the proceedings below, Rawlings challenged the admissibility of certain evidence and statements on the ground that they were the fruits of an illegal detention and illegal searches. The trial court, the Kentucky Court of Appeals, and the Supreme Court of Kentucky all rejected Rawlings’ challenges. We granted certiorari, 444 U. S. 989, and now affirm.

I

In the middle of the afternoon on October 18, 1976, six police officers armed with a warrant for the arrest of one Lawrence Marquess on charges of drug distribution arrived at Marquess’ house in Bowling Green, Ky. In the house at the time the police arrived were one of Marquess’ housemates, Dennis Saddler, and four visitors, Keith Northern, Linda Braden, Vanessa Cox, and petitioner David Rawlings. While searching unsuccessfully in the house for Marquess, several police officers smelled marihuana smoke and saw marihuana seeds on the mantel in one of the bedrooms. After conferring briefly, Officers Eddie Railey and John Bruce left to obtain a search warrant. While Railey and Bruce were gone, the other four officers detained the occupants of the house in the living room, allowing them to leave only if they consented to a body search. Northern and Braden did consent to such a search and were permitted to depart. Saddler, Cox, and petitioner remained seated in the living room.

Approximately 45 minutes later, Railey and Bruce returned with a warrant authorizing them to search the house. Railey read the warrant to Saddler, Cox, and petitioner, and also read “Miranda” warnings from a card he carried in his pocket. At that time, Cox was seated on a couch with petitioner seated to her left. In the space between them was Cox’s handbag.

After Railey finished his recitation, he approached petitioner and told him to stand. Officer Don Bivens simultaneously approached Cox and ordered her to empty the contents of her purse onto a coffee table in front of the couch. Among those contents were a jar containing 1,800 tablets of LSD and a number of smaller vials containing benzphetamine, methamphetamine, methyprylan, and pentobarbital, all of which are controlled substances under Kentucky law.

Upon pouring these objects out onto the coffee table, Cox turned to petitioner and told him “to take what was his.” App. 62. Petitioner, who was standing in response to Officer Railey’s command, immediately claimed ownership of the controlled substances. At that time, Railey searched petitioner’s person and found $4,500 in cash in petitioner’s shirt pocket and a knife in a sheath at petitioner’s side. Railey then placed petitioner under formal arrest.

Petitioner was indicted for possession with intent to sell the various controlled substances recovered from Cox’s purse. At the suppression hearing, he testified that he had flown into Bowling Green about a week before his arrest to look for a job and perhaps to attend the local university. He brought with him at that time the drugs later found in Cox’s purse. Initially, petitioner stayed in the house where the arrest took place as the guest of Michael Swank, who shared the house with Marquess and Saddler. While at a party at that house, he met Cox and spent at least two nights of the next week on a couch at Cox’s house.

On the morning of petitioner’s arrest, Cox had dropped him off at Swank’s house where he waited for her to return from class. At that time, he was carrying the drugs in a green bank bag. When Cox returned to the house to meet him, petitioner dumped the contents of the bank bag into Cox’s purse. Although there is dispute over the discussion that took place, petitioner testified that he “asked her if she would carry this for me, and she said, ‘yes’. . . .” App. 42. Petitioner then left the room to use the bathroom and, by the time he returned, discovered that the police had arrived to arrest Marquess.

The trial court denied petitioner’s motion to suppress the drugs and the money and to exclude the statements made by petitioner when the police discovered the drugs. According to the trial court, the warrant obtained by the police authorized them to search Cox’s purse. Moreover, even if the search of the purse was illegal, the trial court believed that petitioner lacked “standing” to contest that search. Finally, the trial court believed that the search that revealed the money and the knife was permissible “under the exigencies of the situation.” Id., at 21. After a bench trial, petitioner was found guilty of possession with intent to sell LSD and of possession of benzphetamine, methamphetamine, methyprylan, and pentobarbital.

The Kentucky Court of Appeals affirmed. Disagreeing with the trial court, the appellate court held that petitioner did have “standing” to dispute the legality of the search of Cox’s purse but that the detention of the five persons present in the house and the subsequent searches were legitimate because the police had probable cause to arrest all five people in the house when they smelled the marihuana smoke and saw the marihuana seeds.

The Supreme Court of Kentucky in turn affirmed, but again on a somewhat different rationale. See 581 S. W. 2d 348 (1979). According to the Supreme Court, petitioner had no “standing” because he had no “legitimate or reasonable expectation of freedom from governmental intrusion” into Cox’s purse. Id., at 350, citing Rakas v. Illinois, 439 U. S. 128 (1978). Moreover, according to the Supreme Court, the search uncovering the money in petitioner’s pocket, which search followed petitioner’s admission that he owned the drugs in Cox’s purse, was justifiable as incident to a lawful arrest based on probable cause.

II

In this Court, petitioner challenges three aspects of the judgment below. First, he claims that he did have a reasonable expectation of privacy in Cox’s purse so as to allow him to challenge the legality of the search of that purse. Second, petitioner argues that his admission of ownership was the fruit of an illegal detention that began when the police refused to let the occupants of the house leave unless they consented to a search. Third, petitioner contends that the search uncovering the money and the knife was itself illegal.

A

In holding that petitioner could not challenge the legality of the search of Cox’s purse, the Supreme Court of Kentucky looked primarily to our then recent decision in Rakas v. Illinois, supra, where we abandoned a separate inquiry into a defendant’s “standing” to contest an allegedly illegal search in favor of an inquiry that focused directly on the substance of the defendant’s claim that he or she possessed a “legitimate expectation of privacy” in the area searched. See Katz v. United States, 389 U. S. 347 (1967). In the present case, the Supreme Court of Kentucky looked to the “totality of the circumstances,” including petitioner’s own admission at the suppression hearing that he did not believe that Cox’s purse would be free from governmental intrusion, and held that petitioner “[had] not made a sufficient showing that his legitimate or reasonable expectations of privacy were violated” by the search of the purse. 581 S. W. 2d, at 350.

We believe that the record in this case supports that conclusion. Petitioner, of course, bears the burden of proving not only that the search of Cox’s purse was illegal, but also that he had a legitimate expectation of privacy in that purse. See Rakas v. Illinois, supra, at 131, n. 1; Simmons v. United States, 390 U. S. 377, 389-390 (1968). At the time petitioner dumped thousands of dollars worth of illegal drugs into Cox's purse, he had known her for only a few days. According to Cox’s un contested testimony, petitioner had never sought or received access to her purse prior to that sudden bailment. Contrast Jones v. United States, 362 U. S. 257, 259 (1960). Nor did petitioner have any right to exclude other persons from access to Cox’s purse. See Rakas v. Illinois, supra, at 149. In fact, Cox testified that Bob StaJlons, a longtime acquaintance and frequent companion of Cox’s, had free access to her purse and on the very morning of the arrest had rummaged through its contents in search of a hairbrush. Moreover, even assuming that petitioner’s version of the bailment is correct and that Cox did consent to the transfer of possession, the precipitous nature of the transaction hardly supports a reasonable inference that petitioner took normal precautions to maintain his privacy. Contrast United States v. Chadwick, 433 U. S. 1, 11 (1977); Katz v. United States, supra, at 352. In addition to all the foregoing facts, the record also contains a frank admission by petitioner that he had no subjective expectation that Cox’s purse would remain free from governmental intrusion, an admission credited by both the trial court and the Supreme Court of Kentucky. See n. 3, supra, and accompanying text.

Petitioner contends nevertheless that, because he claimed ownership of the drugs in Cox’s purse, he should be entitled to challenge the search regardless of his expectation of privacy. We disagree. While petitioner’s ownership of the drugs is undoubtedly one fact to be considered in this case, Rakas emphatically rejected the notion that “arcane” concepts of property law ought to control the ability to claim the protections of the Fourth Amendment. See 439 U. S., at 149-150, n. 17. See also United States v. Salvucci, ante, at 91-92. Had petitioner placed his drugs in plain view, he would still have owned them, but he could not claim any legitimate expectation of privacy. Prior to Rakas, petitioner might have been given “standing” in such a case to challenge a “search” that netted those drugs but probably would have lost his claim on the merits. After Rakas, the two inquiries merge into one: whether governmental officials violated any legitimate expectation of priyacy held by petitioner.

In sum, we find no reason to overturn the lower court’s conclusion that petitioner had no legitimate expectation of privacy in Cox’s purse at the time of the search.

B

We turn, then, to petitioner’s contention that the occupants of the house were illegally detained by the police and that his admission to ownership of the drugs was a fruit of that illegal detention. Somewhat surprisingly, none of the courts below confronted this issue squarely, even though it would seem to be presented under any analysis of this case except that adopted by the Kentucky Court of Appeals, which concluded that the police officers were entitled to arrest the five occupants of the house as soon as they smelled marihuana smoke and saw the marihuana seeds.

We can assume both that this issue was properly presented in the Kentucky courts and that the police violated the Fourth and Fourteenth Amendments by detaining petitioner and his companions in the house while they obtained a search warrant for the premises. Even given such a constitutional violation, however, exclusion of petitioner’s admissions would not be necessary unless his statements were the result of his illegal detention. As we noted in Brown v. Illinois, 422 U. S. 590, 603 (1975), where we rejected a “but for” approach to the admissibility of such statements, “persons arrested illegally frequently may decide to confess, as an act of free will unaffected by the initial illegality.” In Brown we also set forth the standard for determining whether such statements were tainted by antecedent illegality:

“The question whether a confession is the product of a free will . . . must be answered on the facts of each case. No single fact is dispositive. . . . The Miranda warnings are an important factor, to be sure, in determining whether the confession is obtained by exploitation of an illegal arrest. But they are not the only factor to be considered. The temporal proximity of the arrest and the confession, the presence of intervening circumstances, and, particularly, the purpose and flagrancy of the official misconduct are all relevant. The voluntariness of the statement is a threshold requirement. And the burden of showing admissibility rests, of course, on the prosecution.” Id., at 603-604 (footnotes and citations omitted).

See also Dunaway v. New York, 442 U. S. 200, 218 (1979). As already noted, the lower courts did not undertake the inquiry suggested by Brown. Nevertheless, as in Brown itself, we believe that “the trial resulted in a record of amply sufficient detail and depth from which the determination may be made.” 422 U. S., at 604.

First, we observe that petitioner received Miranda warnings only moments before he made his incriminating statements, a consideration Brown treated as important, although not dis-positive, in determining whether the statements at issue were obtained by exploitation of an illegal detention.

Second, Brown calls our attention to the “temporal proximity of the arrest and the confession. . . .” Id., at 603. In this case, petitioner and his companions were detained for a period of approximately 45 minutes. Although under the strictest of custodial conditions such a short lapse of time might not suffice to purge the initial taint, we believe it necessary to examine the precise conditions under which the occupants of this house were detained. By all accounts, the three people who chose not to consent to a body search in order to leave sat quietly in the living room or, at least initially, moved freely about the first floor of the house. Upon being informed that he would be detained until Officers Railey and Bruce returned with a search warrant, Dennis Saddler “just went on in and got a cup of coffee and sat down and started waiting” for the officers to return. Tr. 109. When asked by petitioner’s counsel whether there was “any show of force or violence by you or Dave or anybody else,” Saddler explained:

“A Oh, no. One person tried to sick my four and a half month old dog on one of the officers, (laughing)
“Q48 You’re saying that in a joking manner?
“A Yeah. He just wagged his tail.
“Q49 And other than that, that’s the most violent thing you proposed toward these police officers; is that correct?
“A Yes sir. I would — they were more or less courteous to us and were trying to be — we offered them coffee or a drink of water or whatever they wanted.” Id., at 113.

According to Saddler, petitioner’s first reaction when the officers told him that he would be detained pending issuance of a search warrant was to “[get] up and put an album on. . . .” Id., at 110. As even the dissenting judge in the Court of Appeals noted: “[A]ll witnesses for both sides of this litigation agreed to the congenial atmosphere existing during the forty-five minute interval. . . .” App. 73 (Lester, J., dissenting). We think that these circumstances outweigh the relatively short period of time that elapsed between the initiation of the detention and petitioner’s admissions.

Third, Brown suggests that we inquire whether any circumstances intervened between the initial detention and the challenged statements. Here, where petitioner’s admissions were apparently spontaneous reactions to the discovery of his drugs in Cox’s purse, we have little doubt that this factor weighs heavily in favor of a finding that petitioner acted “of free will unaffected by the initial illegality.” 422 U. S., at 603. Nor need we speculate as to petitioner’s motivations in admitting ownership of the drugs, since he explained them later to Lawrence Marquess and Dennis Saddler. Under examination by petitioner’s counsel, Marquess testified as follows:

“Q1 Mr. Marquess, when you were talking to David Rawlings in the jail, and he told you that the things were dumped out on the table and that he admitted they were his, did he tell you why he did that?
"A Well, he said Vanessa [Cox] was freaking out, you know, or something.
“Q2 Did he tell you that he did that to protect her or words to that effect?
"A Well, now, I mean he said he was going to take what was his, I mean, he wasn’t going to try to pin that on her.” Tr. 130.

Saddler offered additional insight into petitioner’s motivations:

“Q114 Did Dave Rawlings make any statements to you in jail about any of these substances?
“A Yes sir.
“Q115 And would you tell the Court what statements he made?
“A Well, his main concern was whether or not Vanessa Cox was going to say anything, and he just kept talking and harping on that, and I don’t know how many times he mentioned it, you know, ‘I hope she doesn’t break,’ or hope she doesn’t talk. And I saw her walking on the sidewalk through the windows and got a little upset about that because we all thought she turned State’s evidence.” Id., at 103.

Fourth, Brown mandates consideration of “the purpose and flagrancy of the official misconduct. . . .” 422 U. S., at 604. The officers who detained petitioner and his companions uniformly testified that they took those measures to avoid the asportation or destruction of the marihuana they thought was present in the house and that they believed that a warrant authorizing them to search the house would also authorize them to search the five occupants of the house. While the legality of temporarily detaining a person at the scene of suspected drug activity to secure a search warrant may be an open question, and while the officer’s belief about the scope of the warrant they obtained may well have been erroneous under our recent decision in Ybarra v. Illinois, 444 U. S. 85 (1979), the conduct of the police here does not rise to the level of conscious or flagrant misconduct requiring prophylactic exclusion of petitioner’s statements. Contrast Brown v. Illinois, supra, at 605.

Finally, while Brown requires that the voluntariness of the statement be established as a threshold requirement, petitioner has not argued here or in any other court that his admission to ownership of the drugs was anything other than voluntary. Thus, examining the totality of circumstances present in this case, we believe that the Commonwealth of Kentucky has carried its burden of showing that petitioner’s statements were acts of free will unaffected by any illegality in the initial detention.

C

Petitioner also contends that the search of his person that uncovered the money and the knife was illegal. Like the Supreme Court of Kentucky, we have no difficulty upholding this search as incident to petitioner’s formal arrest. Once petitioner admitted ownership of the sizable quantity of drugs found in Cox’s purse, the police clearly had probable cause to place petitioner under arrest. Where the formal arrest followed quickly on the heels of the challenged search of petitioner’s person, we do not believe it particularly important that the search preceded the arrest rather than vice versa. See Bailey v. United States, 128 U. S. App. D. C. 354, 357, 389 F. 2d 305, 308 (1967); United States v. Brown, 150 U. S. App. D. C. 113, 114, 463 F. 2d 949, 950 (1972). See also Cupp v. Murphy, 412 U. S. 291 (1973); United States v. Gorman, 355 F. 2d 151, 160 (CA2 1965) (dictum), cert. denied, 384 U. S. 1024 (1966).

III

Having found no error in the lower courts’ refusal to suppress the evidence challenged by petitioner, we believe that the judgment of the Supreme Court of Kentucky should be, and the same hereby is,

Affirmed.

Me. Justice Blackmun,

concurring.

I join the Court’s opinion, but I write separately to explain my somewhat different approach to the issues addressed in Part II-A thereof.

In my view, Rakas v. Illinois, 439 U. S. 128 (1978), recognized two analytically distinct but “invariably intertwined” issues of substantive Fourth Amendment jurisprudence. Id., at 139. The first is “whether [a] disputed search or seizure has infringed an interest of the defendant which the Fourth Amendment was designed to protect,” id., at 140; the second is whether “the challenged search or seizure violated [that] Fourth Amendment righ[t],” ibid. The first of these questions is answered by determining whether the defendant has a “legitimate expectation of privacy” that has been invaded by a governmental search or seizure. The second is answered by determining whether applicable cause and warrant requirements have been properly observed.

I agree with the Court that these two inquiries “merge into one,” ante, at 106, in the sense that both are to be addressed under the principles of Fourth Amendment analysis developed in Katz v. United States, 389 U. S. 347 (1967), and its progeny. But I do not read today’s decision, or Rakas, as holding that it is improper for lower courts to treat these inquiries as distinct components of a Fourth Amendment claim. Indeed, I am convinced that it would invite confusion to hold otherwise. It remains possible for a defendant to prove that his legitimate interest of privacy was invaded, and yet fail to prove that the police acted illegally in doing so. And it is equally possible for a defendant to prove that the police acted illegally, and yet fail to prove that his own privacy interest was affected.

Nor do I read this Court’s decisions to hold that property interests cannot be, in some circumstances at least, weighty factors in establishing the existence of Fourth Amendment rights. Not every concept of ownership or possession is “arcane.” Not every interest in property exists only in the desiccated atmosphere of ancient maxims and dusty books. Earlier this Term the Court recognized that “the right to exclude” is an essential element of modern property rights. Kaiser Aetna v. United States, 444 U. S. 164, 179-180 (1979). In my view, that “right to exclude” often may be a principal determinant in the establishment of a legitimate Fourth Amendment interest. Accordingly, I would confine analysis to the facts of this case. On those facts, however, I agree that petitioner’s possessory interest in the vials of controlled substances is not sufficient to create a privacy interest in Vanessa Cox’s purse, and that such an interest was not otherwise conferred by any agreement between petitioner and Cox.

Mr. Justice White,

with whom Mr. Justice Stewart joins, concurring in part.

Although I join Parts I and II-A of the Court’s opinion, I do not join Parts II-B, II-C, and III because I believe that the fruits inquiry undertaken in Part II-B should not be done in the first instance in this Court. As the Court recognizes, the Supreme Court of Kentucky did not address the question whether petitioner’s admission to ownership of the drugs was the fruit of an illegal detention, even though the question was presented there. The state-court majority did state that in concluding that the search of petitioner’s person was incident to a valid arrest it “disregard [ed] as irrelevant the detention during the period in which the officers were procuring a search warrant.” The court also observed that “[t]his search was not explored in detail at the suppression hearing” and that “the sequence of the search of the purse and Rawlings’ admission of ownership of the drugs is not clearly established in the record.” The court then concluded that “[cjlearly, after Rawlings admitted ownership of the drugs, the officers were entitled to arrest and search the person, or search and then arrest.” 581 S. W. 2d 348, 350 (1979).

In proceeding in this manner, the Supreme Court of Kentucky plainly failed properly to dispose of a federal question, as the Court implicitly recognizes. Because the fruits question was never addressed below and was barely mentioned in the briefs before this Court, I would vacate the judgment below and remand to permit the state court to address the question under the correct legal standard. This Court should not attempt to decide a factual issue on a record that the state court itself apparently thought inadequate for that purpose.

Me. Justice Marshall,

with whom Me. Justice Brennan joins, dissenting.

The vials of pills found in Vanessa Cox’s purse and petitioner’s admission that they belonged to him established his guilt conclusively. The State concedes, as it must, that the search of the purse was unreasonable and in violation of the Fourth Amendment, see Ybarra v. Illinois, 444 U. S. 85 (1979), and the Court assumes that the detention which led to the search, the seizure, and the admissions also violated the Fourth Amendment, ante, at 106. Nevertheless, the Court upholds the conviction. I dissent.

I

The Court holds first that petitioner may not object to the introduction of the pills into evidence because the unconstitutional actions of the police officers did not violate his personal Fourth Amendment rights. To reach this result, the Court holds that the Constitution protects an individual against unreasonable searches and seizures only if he has “a ‘legitimate expectation of privacy’ in the area searched.” Ante, at 104. This holding cavalierly rejects the fundamental principle, unquestioned until today, that an interest in either the place searched or the property seized is sufficient to invoke the Constitution’s protections against unreasonable searches and seizures.

The Court’s examination of previous Fourth Amendment cases begins and ends — as it must if it is to reach its desired conclusion — with Rakas v. Illinois, 439 U. S. 128 (1978). Contrary to the Court’s assertion, however, Rakas did not establish that the Fourth Amendment protects individuals against unreasonable searches and seizures only if they have a privacy interest in the place searched. The question before the Court in Rakas was whether the defendants could establish their right to Fourth Amendment protection simply by showing that they were “legitimately on [the] premises” searched, see Jones v. United States, 362 U. S. 257, 267 (1960), Overruling that portion of Jones, the Court held that when a Fourth Amendment objection is based on an interest in the place searched, the defendant must show an actual invasion of his personal privacy interest. The petitioners in Bakas did not claim that they had standing either under the Jones automatic standing rule for persons charged with possessory offenses, which the Court overrules today, see United States v. Salvucci, ante, p. 83, or because their pos-sessory interest in the items seized gave them “actual standing.” No Fourth Amendment claim based on an interest in the property seized was before the Court, and, consequently, the Court did not and could not have decided whether such a claim could be maintained. In fact, the Court expressly disavowed any intention to foreclose such a claim (“This is not to say that such [casual] visitors could not contest the lawfulness of the seizure of evidence or the search if their own property were seized during the search,” 439 U. S., at 142, n. 11), and suggested its continuing validity (“[Petitioners’ claims must fail. They asserted neither a property nor a possessory interest in the automobile, nor an interest in the ;property seized,” id., at 148 (emphasis supplied)).

The decision today, then, is not supported by the only case directly cited in its favor. Further, the Court has ignored a long tradition embodying the opposite view. United States v. Jeffers, 342 U. S. 48 (1951), for example, involved a seizure of contraband alleged to belong to the defendant from a hotel room occupied by his two aunts. The Court rejected the Government’s argument that because the search of the room did not invade Jeffers’ privacy he lacked standing to suppress the evidence. It held that standing to object to the seizure could not be separated from standing to object to the search, for “[t]he search and seizure are . . . incapable of being untied.” Id., at 52. The Court then concluded that Jeffers “unquestionably had standing ... unless the contraband nature of the narcotics seized precluded his assertion, for purposes of the exclusionary rule, of a property interest therein.” Ibid, (emphasis supplied).

Similarly, Jones v. United States, supra, is quite plainly premised on the understanding that an interest in the seized property is sufficient to establish that the defendant “himself was the victim of an invasion of privacy.” 362 U. S., at 261. The Court observed that the “conventional standing requirement,” id., at 262, required the defendant to “claim either to have ovmed or possessed the seized property or to have had a substantial possessory interest in the premises searched,” id., at 261 (emphasis supplied). The Court relaxed that rule for defendants charged with possessory offenses because “[t]he same element . . . which has caused a dilemma, i. e., that possession both convicts and confers standing, eliminates any necessity for a preliminary showing of an interest in the premises searched or the property seized, which ordinarily is required when standing is challenged.” Id., at 263 (emphasis supplied). Instead, “[t]he possession on the basis of which petitioner is to be and was convicted suffices to give him standing,” id., at 264.

Simmons v. United States, 390 U. S. 377 (1968), proceeded upon a like understanding. The Court there reiterated that prior to Jones “a defendant who wished to assert a Fourth Amendment objection was required to show that he was the owner or possessor of the seized property or that he had a possessory interest in the searched premises.” 390 U. S., at 389-390 (emphasis supplied). Jones had changed that rule only with respect to defendants charged with possessory offenses, so the defendant Garrett, who was charged with armed robbery, had to establish standing; Because he was not “legitimately on [the] premises” at the time of the search, see Jones, supra, at 267, “[t]he only, or at least the most natural, way in which he could found standing to object to the admission of the suitcase was to testify that he was its owner.” 390 U. S., at 391 (footnote omitted). See also Brown v. United States, 411 U. S. 223, 228 (1973); Mancusi v. DeForte, 392 U. S. 364, 367 (1968).

The Court’s decision today is not wrong, however, simply because it is contrary to our previous cases. It is wrong because it is contrary to the Fourth Amendment, which guarantees that “[t]he right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated.” The Court’s reading of the Amendment is far too narrow. The Court misreads the guarantee of security “in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures” to afford protection only against unreasonable searches and seizures of persons and places.

The Fourth Amendment, it seems to me, provides in plain language that if one’s security in one’s “effects” is disturbed by an unreasonable search and seizure, one has been the victim of a constitutional violation; and so it has always been understood. Therefore the Court’s insistence that in order to challenge the legality of the search one must also assert a protected interest in the premises is misplaced. The interest in the item seized is quite enough to establish that the defendant’s personal Fourth Amendment rights have been invaded by the government’s conduct.

The idea that a person cannot object to a search unless he can show an interest in the premises, even though he is the owner of the seized property, was squarely rejected almost 30 years ago in United States v. Jeffers, supra. There the Court stated:

“The Government argues . . . that the search did not invade respondent’s privacy and that he, therefore, lacked the necessary standing to suppress the evidence seized. The significant act, it says, is the seizure of the goods of the respondent without a warrant. We do not believe the events are so easily isolable. Rather they are bound together by one sole purpose — to locate and seize the narcotics of respondent. The search and seizure are, therefore, incapable of being untied. To hold that this search and seizure were lawful as to the respondent would permit a quibbling distinction to overturn a principle which was designed to protect a fundamental right.” Id., at 52.

When the government seizes a person’s property, it interferes with his constitutionally protected right to be secure in his effects. That interference gives him the right to challenge the reasonableness of the government’s conduct, including the seizure. If the defendant’s property was seized as the result of an unreasonable search, the seizure cannot be other than unreasonable.

In holding that the Fourth Amendment protects only those with a privacy interest in the place searched, and not those with an ownership or possessory interest in the things seized, the Court has turned the development of the law of search and seizure on its head. The history of the Fourth Amendment shows that it was designed to protect property interests as well as privacy interests; in fact, until Jones the question whether a person’s Fourth Amendment rights had been violated turned on whether he had a property interest in the place searched or the items seized. Jones and Katz v. United States, 389 U. S. 347 (1967), expanded our view of the protections afforded by the Fourth Amendment by recognizing that privacy interests are protected even if they do not arise from property rights. But that recognition was never intended to exclude interests that had historically been sheltered by the Fourth Amendment from its protection. Neither Jones nor Katz purported to provide an exclusive, definition of the interests protected by the Fourth Amendment. Indeed, as Katz recognized: “That Amendment protects individual privacy against certain kinds of governmental intrusion, but its protections go further, and often have nothing to do with privacy at all.” 389 U. S., at 350. Those decisions freed Fourth Amendment jurisprudence from the constraints of “subtle distinctions, developed and refined by the common law in evolving the body of private property law which, more than almost any other branch of law, has been shaped by distinctions whose validity is largely historical.” Jones, 362 U. S., at 266. Rejection of those finely drawn distinctions as irrelevant to the concerns of the Fourth Amendment did not render property rights wholly outside its protection, however. Not every concept involving property rights, we should remember, is “arcane.” Cf. ante, at 105.

In fact, the Court rather inconsistently denies that property rights may, by themselves, entitle one to the protection of the Fourth Amendment; but simultaneously suggests that a person may claim such protection only if his expectation of privacy in the premises searched is so strong that he may exclude all others from that place. See ante, at 105-106; Rakas v. Illinois, 439 U. S., at 149. Such a harsh threshold requirement was not imposed even in the heyday of a property rights oriented Fourth Amendment.

II

Petitioner also contends that his admission of ownership of the drugs should have been suppressed as the fruit of an unlawful detention. The state courts did not pass on that claim, and no factual record was developed which would shed light on the proper disposition of the claim. In such circumstances, it would be appropriate for us to defer to the state court and permit it to make the initial determination. Nevertheless, the majority proceeds to dispose of petitioner’s claim by concluding that, even if the detention was illegal, “petitioner’s statements were acts of free will unaffected by any illegality in the initial detention.” Ante, at 110. I disagree.

Petitioner’s admissions, far from being “spontaneous,” ante, at 108, were made in response to Vanessa Cox’s demand that petitioner “take what was his.” In turn, it is plain that her statement was the direct product of the illegal search of her purse. And that search was made possible only because the police refused to let anyone in the house depart unless they “consented” to a body search; that detention the Court has assumed was illegal. Under these circumstances petitioner’s admissions were obviously the fruit of the illegal detention and should have been suppressed.

III

In the words of Mr. Justice Frankfurter: “A decision [of a Fourth Amendment claim] may turn on whether one gives that Amendment a place second to none in the Bill of Rights, or considers it on the whole a kind of nuisance, a serious impediment in the war against crime.” Harris v. United States, 331 U. S. 145, 157 (1947) (dissenting opinion). Today amar 7 jority of 'the Court has substantially cut back the protection af- V forded by the Fourth Amendment and the ability of theS people to claim that protection, apparently out of concern lest the government’s ability to obtain criminal convictions be impeded. A slow and steady erosion of the ability of victims of unconstitutional searches and seizures to obtain a remedy for the invasion of their rights saps the constitutional guarantee of its life just as surely as would a substantive limitation. Because we are called on to decide whether evidence should be excluded only when a search has been “successful,” it is easy to forget that the standards we announce determine what government conduct is reasonable in searches and seizures directed at persons who turn out to be innocent as well as those who are guilty. I continue to believe that ungrudging application of the Fourth Amendment is indispensable to preserving the liberties of a democratic society. Accordingly, I dissent.

       At petitioner’s trial, Vanessa Cox described the transfer of possession quite differently. She testified that, as she and petitioner were getting ready to leave the house, petitioner asked “would you please carry this for me” and simultaneously dumped the drugs into her purse. According to Cox, she looked into her purse, saw the drugs, and said “would you please take this, I do not want this in my purse.” Petitioner allegedly replied “okay, just a minute, I will,” and then went out of the room. At that point the police entered the house. Tr. 12-14. David Saddler, who was in the next room at the time of the transfer, corroborated Cox’s version of the events, testifying that he heard Cox say “I do not want this in my purse” and that he heard petitioner reply “don’t worry” or something to that effect. Id., at 100.
      none courts specifically found that Cox did not consent to the bailment, the trial court clearly was skeptical about petitioner’s version of events:
      of his own volition, David Rawlings put the contraband in the purse of Mrs. Cox just a minute before the officers knocked on the door. He had been carrying these things around Bowling Green in a bank deposit sack for days, either on his person or in his pocket, and it is unworthy of belief that just immediately before the officers knocked on the door that he put them in the purse of Vanessa Cox. It is far more plausible to believe that he saw the officers pull up out front and then elected to ‘push them off’ on Vanessa Cox, believing that search was probable, possible, and emminent [sic].” App. 21.

       Petitioner also claims that he is entitled to “automatic standing” to contest the legality of the search that uncovered the drugs. See Jones v. United States, 362 U. S. 257 (1960). Our decision today in United States v. Salvucci, ante, p. 83, disposes of this contention adversely to him.

       Under questioning by his own counsel, petitioner testified as follows:
      “Q72 Did you feel that Vannessa [sic] Cox’s purse would be free from the intrusion of the officers as you sat there? When you put the pills in her purse, did you feel that they would be free from governmental intrusion?
      “A No sir.” App. 48.
      The trial court also credited this statement, noting immediately:
      know what, I believe this boy tells the truth. You all wanted to bring him in here before the Court, and he said, 'no, I want a jury.’ He said 'no, I don’t understand that.’ And I don’t blame him for not understanding that. That’s the first time I've ever seen such a thing brought on before this Court, and I’ve been here for quite a few years as an attorney, of course.
      “Now, no question but what the boy fully understood what was meant-by that. None at all in the Court’s mind. If you want to go ahead, you can do so.” Ibid.

       But see n. 1, supra.

       “The reasonableness of seizures that are less intrusive than a traditional arrest, see Dunaway v. New York, 442 U. S. 200, 209-210 (1979); Terry v. Ohio, 392 U. S. 1, 20 (1968), depends 'on a balance between the public interest and the individual’s right to personal security free from arbitrary interference by law officers.’ Pennsylvania v. Mimms, 434 U. S. 106, 109 (1977); United States v. Brignoni-Ponce, [422 U. S. 873, 878 (1975)]. Consideration of the constitutionality of such seizures involves a weighing of the gravity of the public concerns served by the seizure, the degree to which the seizure advances the public interest, and the severity of the interference with individual liberty.” Brown v. Texas, 443 U. S. 47, 50-51 (1979).

       The fruits of the search of petitioner’s person were, of course, not necessary to support probable cause to arrest petitioner.

      The Court invites the reader to “contrast” Jones v. United States, 362 U. S. 257 (1960), which it expressly overrules, and to “see” Simmons v. United States, 390 U. S. 377, 389-390 (1968). Ante, at 105, 104. The passage cited in Simmons contains the following language: “At one time, a defendant who wished to assert a Fourth Amendment objection was required to show that he was the owner or possessor of the seized property or that he had a possessory interest in the searched premises.” 390 U. S., at 389-390 (emphasis supplied). The Court in Simmons then observed that Jones had “relaxed” those standing requirements by holding that in a case charging a possessory offense “the Government is precluded from denying that the defendant has the requisite possessory interest to chai-lenge the admission of the evidence. . . 390 U. S., at 390. The Court also “contrasts” two other cases in connection with its subsidiary point that a “bailment” that is “precipitous” may not be enough to show that a person “took normal precautions to maintain his privacy.” Ante, at 105. The Court also cites Katz v. United States, 389 U. S. 347 (1967), as the source of the phrase “legitimate expectation of privacy.” But Katz did not purport to restrict the interest protected by the Fourth Amendment, see infra, at 119-120.


author: Mr. Justice Stevens Me. Justice Powell,

text:
    MAHER, COMMISSIONER OF INCOME MAINTENANCE OF CONNECTICUT v. GAGNE
    No. 78-1888.
    Argued January 9, 1980
    Decided June 25, 1980

      Stevens, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which Brennan, Stewart, White, Marshall, and Blackmun, JJ., joined, and in Part II of which Burger, C. J., and Powell and Rehnquist, JJ., joined. Powell, J., filed an opinion concurring in part and concurring in the judgment, in which Burger, C. J., and Rehnquist, J., joined, post, p. 133.

      Edmund C. Walsh, Assistant Attorney General of Connecticut, argued the cause for petitioner. With him on the brief was Carl R. Ajello, Attorney General.

      Joan Eisenman Pilver argued the cause for respondent. With her on the brief were Michael B. Trister and David C. Shaw.

   Mr. Justice Stevens

delivered the opinion of the Court.

In an action brought under 42 U. S. C. § 1983, the court, in its discretion, may allow the prevailing party to recover a reasonable attorney’s fee as part of the award of costs. The question presented by this petition is whether fees may be assessed against state officials after a case has been settled by the entry of a consent decree, without any determination that the plaintiff’s constitutional rights have been violated.

Petitioner is responsible for the administration of Connecticut’s Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC), a federally funded public assistance program. Respondent is a working recipient of AFDC benefits. Under state and federal regulations, the amount of her benefits depends, in part, on her net earnings, which are defined as her wages minus certain work-related expenses. In 1975 respondent filed a complaint in the United States District Court for the District of Connecticut alleging that Connecticut’s AFDC regulations denied her credit for substantial portions of her actual work-related expenses, thus reducing the level of her benefits. Her complaint alleged that these regulations violated § 402 (a) (7) of the Social Security Act, 42 U. S. C. § 602 (a)(7), and the Equal Protection and Due Process Clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution. The complaint further alleged that relief was authorized by 42 U. S. C. § 1983 and invoked federal jurisdiction under 28 U. S. C. § 1343.

A few months after the action was commenced, while discovery was underway, petitioner amended the AFDC regulations to authorize a deduction for all reasonable work-related expenses. After an interval of almost a year and a half, respondent filed an amended complaint alleging that actual expenses in excess of certain standard allowances were still being routinely disallowed. Thereafter, a settlement was negotiated and the District Court entered a consent decree that, among other things, provided for a substantial increase in the standard allowances and gave AFDC recipients the right to prove that their actual work-related expenses were in excess of the standard. The parties informally agreed that the question whether respondent was entitled to recover attorney’s fees would be submitted to the District Court after the entry of the consent decree.

Following an adversary hearing, the District Court awarded respondent’s counsel a fee of $3,012.19. 455 F. Supp. 1344 (1978). The court held that respondent was the “prevailing party” within the meaning of § 1988 because, while not prevailing “in every particular,” she had won “substantially all of the relief originally sought in her complaint” in the consent decree. Id., at 1347. The court also rejected petitioner’s argument that an award of fees against him was barred by the Eleventh Amendment in the absence of a judicial determination that respondent’s constitutional rights had been violated. Relying on the basic policy against deciding constitutional claims unnecessarily, the court held that respondent was entitled to fees under the Act because, in addition to her statutory claim, she had alleged constitutional claims that were sufficiently substantial to support federal jurisdiction under the reasoning of Hagans v. Lavine, 415 U. S. 528.

The Court of Appeals affirmed, 594 F. 2d 336 (CA2 1979), holding that Congress intended to authorize an award of fees in this kind of situation and that it had the constitutional power to do so. We granted certiorari to consider both the statutory and constitutional questions. 444 U. S. 824.

I

Petitioner’s first argument is that Congress did not intend to authorize the award of attorney’s fees in every type of § 1983 action, but rather limited the courts’ authority to award fees to cases in which § 1983 is invoked as a remedy for a constitutional violation or a violation of a federal statute providing for the protection of civil rights or equal rights. In support of this contention, petitioner relies on our holding in Chapman v. Houston Welfare Rights Organisation, 441 U. S. 600, that there is no federal jurisdiction under § 1343 over § 1983 claims outside these categories and that there is therefore no jurisdiction under § 1343 over a § 1983 claim based solely on a violation of the Social Security Act. Characterizing respondent’s claim in this case as arising solely out of a Social Security Act violation, petitioner argues that the District Court had no authority under § 1988 to award her attorney’s fees.

Even if petitioner’s characterization of respondent’s claim were correct, his argument would have to be rejected. In Maine v. Thiboutot, ante, p. 1, decided this day, we hold that § 1988 applies to all types of § 1983 actions, including actions based solely on Social Security Act violations. As Mr. Justice Brennan’s opinion for the Court in Thihoutot demonstrates, neither the language of § 1988 nor its legislative history provides any basis for importing the distinctions Chapman made among § 1983 actions for purposes of federal jurisdiction into the award of attorney’s fees by a court that possesses jurisdiction over the claim.

We also find no merit in petitioner’s suggestion that respondent was not the “prevailing party” within the meaning of § 1988. The fact that respondent prevailed through a settlement rather than through litigation does not weaken her claim to fees. Nothing in the language of § 1988 conditions the District Court’s power to award fees on full litigation of the issues or on a judicial determination that the plaintiff’s rights have been violated. Moreover, the Senate Report expressly stated that “for purposes of the award of counsel fees, parties may be considered to have prevailed when they vindicate rights through a consent judgment or without formally obtaining relief.” S. Rep. No. 94-1011, p. 5 (1976).

Nor can we accept petitioner’s contention that respondent did not gain sufficient relief through the consent decree to be considered the prevailing party. The District Court’s contrary finding was based on its familiarity with the progress of the litigation through the pleading, discovery, and settlement negotiation stages. That finding was upheld by the Court of Appeals, and we see no reason to question its validity. See Graver Mfg. Co. v. Linde Co., 336 U. S. 271, 275.

II

Petitioner’s second argument is that, regardless of Congress’ intent, a federal court is barred by the Eleventh Amendment from awarding fees against a State in a case involving a purely statutory, non-civil-rights claim. Petitioner argues that Congress may empower federal courts to award fees against the States only insofar as it is exercising its power under § 5 of the Fourteenth Amendment to enforce substantive rights conferred by that Amendment. Thus, petitioner contends that fees can only be assessed in § 1983 actions brought to vindicate Fourteenth Amendment rights or to enforce civil rights statutes that were themselves enacted pursuant to § 5 of the Fourteenth Amendment.

In this case, there is no need to reach the question whether a federal court could award attorney’s fees against a State based on a statutory, non-civil-rights claim. For, contrary to petitioner’s characterization, respondent did allege violations of her Fourteenth Amendment due process and equal proteetion rights, which the District Court and the Court of Appeals both held to be sufficiently substantial to support federal jurisdiction under Hagans v. Lavine, 415 U. S. 528. Although petitioner is correct that the trial judge did not find any constitutional violation, the constitutional issues remained in the case until the entire dispute was settled by the entry of a consent decree. Under these circumstances, petitioner’s Eleventh Amendment claim is foreclosed by our decision in Hutto v. Finney, 437 U. S. 678.

In Hutto, we rejected the argument of the Attorney General of Arkansas that the general language of § 1988 was insufficient to overcome a State’s claim of immunity under the Eleventh Amendment, noting that “[t]he Court has never viewed the Eleventh Amendment as barring such awards, even in suits between States and individual litigants.” Id., at 695. Moreover, even if the Eleventh Amendment would otherwise present a barrier to an award of fees against a State, Congress was clearly acting within its power under i 5 of the Fourteenth Amendment in removing that barrier. Under § 5 Congress may pass any legislation that is appropriate to enforce the guarantees of the Fourteenth Amendment. A statute awarding attorney’s fees to a person who prevails on a Fourteenth Amendment claim falls within the category of “appropriate” legislation. And clearly Congress was not limited to awarding fees only when a constitutional or civil rights claim is actually decided. We agree with the courts below that Congress was acting within its enforcement power in allowing the award of fees in a case in which the plaintiff prevails on a wholly statutory, non-civil-rights claim pendent to a substantial constitutional claim or in one in which both a statutory and a substantial constitutional claim are settled favorably to the plaintiff without adjudication. As the Court of Appeals pointed out, such a fee award “furthers the Congressional goal of encouraging suits to vindicate constitutional rights without undermining the longstanding judicial policy of avoiding unnecessary decision of important constitutional issues.” 594 F. 2d, at 342. It is thus an appropriate means of enforcing substantive rights under the Fourteenth Amendment.

The judgment is affirmed.

So ordered.

Me. Justice Powell,

with whom The Chief Justice and Me. Justice Rehnquist join, concurring in the judgment, and in Part II of the Court’s opinion.

Respondent’s complaint presented claims under both the Social Security Act and the Fourteenth Amendment. Following a settlement between the parties, the District Court ruled that respondent is a “prevailing party” under 42 U. S. C. § 1988, and that she alleged “substantial” constitutional claims as defined in Hagans v. Lavine, 415 U. S. 528 (1974).

In this situation, the District Court and the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit both found, the award of attorney’s fees under § 1988 does not require an adjudication on the merits of the constitutional claims. I agree with this conclusion. Consequently, I see no reason to reach out, as the Court does in Part I of its opinion, to apply today’s ruling in Maine v. Thiboutot, ante, p. 1. See ante, at 128-129. That decision holds that plaintiffs may win attorney’s fees under § 1988 when they bring an action under 42 U. S. C. § 1983 without any constitutional claim whatever. For the reasons given in my dissenting opinion in Thiboutot, I believe that decision seriously misconceives the congressional purpose behind § 1983. In this case, however, the complaint included a substantial constitutional claim which “remained in the case until the entire dispute was settled by the entry of a consent decree.” Ante, at 131. Since Congress has made plain its intent that fees be awarded to “prevailing” parties in these circumstances, see ante, at 132-133, n. 15, we have no occasion to look behind the settlement agreement to evaluate further the constitutional cause of action.

In contrast, Part II of the Court’s opinion resolves the Eleventh Amendment question on the' narrow ground that respondent alleged “substantial” Fourteenth Amendment claims. Ante, at 131. Hutto v. Finney, 437 U. S. 678 (1978), held that since Congress may qualify the States’ Eleventh Amendment immunity under the Enforcement Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, § 1988 authorizes fee awards against States in these circumstances. I believe that Congress should not be deemed to have qualified the Eleventh Amendment in the absence of explicit evidence of that intent. See Hutto, supra, at 704 (Powell, J., concurring in part and dissenting in part). Nevertheless, I accept Hutto as binding precedent for this case and note only that the Court has reserved the question “whether a federal court could award attorney's fees against a State based on a statutory, non-civil-rights claim.” Ante, at 130.

       The Civil Rights Attorney's Fees Awards Act of 1976, 90 Stat. 2641, provides:
      “In any action or proceeding to enforce a provision of sections 1977, 1978, 1979, 1980, and 1981 of the Revised Statutes, title IX of Public Law 92-318, or in any civil action or proceeding, by or on behalf of the United States of America, to enforce, or charging a violation of, a provision of the United States Internal Revenue Code, or title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the court, in its discretion, may allow the prevailing party, other than the United States, a reasonable attorney’s fee as part of the cpsts.”
      This statute is codifiéá in 42 U. S. C. § 1988; in the codification § 1979 of the Revised Statutes has been renumbered to refer to § 1983 of Title 42 of the United States Code.

       The action was filed against petitioner’s predecessor in oflice, Nicholas Norton, Commissioner of Welfare of the State of Connecticut. The title of the position has since been changed to “Commissioner of Income Maintenance.” We shall simply refer to the Commissioner as “petitioner.”

       Connecticut’s Department of Social Services Manual provided that only certain enumerated expenses could be deducted; the amounts allowed for lunches and automobile transportation were limited to 50 cents per working day and 6 cents per mile respectively. App. 66. The complaint alleged that respondent's actual transportation expenses were 13.9 cents per mile and that her meal expenses amounted to $1.65 per day. Id., at 8.

         The statute requires States to take into reasonably attributable to the earning of . . . income.” In Shea v. Vialpando, 416 U. S. 251, this Court held that participating States could not place arbitrary limits on the amount of work-related expenses that could be claimed by recipients. Although States may use standardized allowances for the sake of administrative convenience, they must give recipients the opportunity to demonstrate that their actual expenses exceed the standard.

       In her complaint respondent alleged:
      “28. Defendants’ practice and policy constitute an against persons whose work-related expenses exceed the allowances set forth in Index 332.31 and violate the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution by forbidding plaintiff and the class she represents ever from controverting the presumption that their work-related expenses exceeding the transportation and food allowances of Index 332.31 are reasonable.
      “32. Defendants’ practice and policy violate the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution in that:
      “a) Defendants’ practice sumption that the plaintiff’s work-related transportation and lunch allowances are unreasonable and operate to deny plaintiff and the class she represents a fair opportunity to rebut it.
      “b) The standard lunch and transportation aEowances Index 332.31 are arbitrary in that they were not developed by a statisti-caUy fair averaging, nor do they reflect current prices.” App. 9-10.

       “Every person, who, under color any custom, or usage, of any State or Territory, subjects or causes to be subjected, any citizen of the United States or other person within the jurisdiction thereof to the deprivation of any rights, privileges, or immunities secured by the Constitution and laws, shall be liable to the party injured in an action at law, suit in equity, or other proper proceeding for redress.”

       Title 28 U. S. C. §§ 1343 (3) and (4) provide as follows:
      “The district courts shall have original jurisdiction of any civil action authorized by law to be commenced by any person:
      “(3) To redress the deprivation, under color of any State law, statute, ordinance, regulation, custom or usage of any right, privilege or immunity secured by the Constitution of the United States or by any Act of Congress providing for equal rights of citizens or of all persons within the jurisdiction of the United States;
      “(4) To recover damages or to secure equitable or other relief under any Act of Congress providing for the protection of civil rights, including the right to vote.”

       As is customary, the consent decree did not purport to adjudicate respondent’s statutory or constitutional claims. Rather, it explicitly stated that “[n]othing in this Consent Decree is intended to constitute an admission of fault by either party to this action.” App. 76.

       The court rejected petitioner’s constitutional claim on two grounds. First, it held that the Eleventh Amendment does not apply to an award of attorney’s fees because such fees are ancillary to the imposition of prospective relief within the reasoning of Edelman v. Jordan, 415 U. S. 651. Second, the court held that, even if the Eleventh Amendment did apply, Congress had the power to authorize the assessment of fees in a case such as this under the Fourteenth Amendment:
      “The State contends, however, that Congress’ power under the Fourteenth Amendment to override state sovereign immunity extends only to suits in which a party prevails on a constitutional claim. On this view, Congress cannot validly authorize a fee award against a state in the absence of a judicial determination that plaintiff had a meritorious constitutional claim. We disagree. We think it is within Congress’ Fourteenth Amendment power to authorize a fee award when a party prevails on a statutory claim as long as the pendent constitutional claim is a substantial one and arises out of the same operative facts. Such a fee award furthers the Congressional goal of encouraging suits to vindicate constitutional rights without undermining the longstanding judicial policy of avoiding unnecessary decision of important constitutional issues. As we understand the Supreme Court decisions, any appropriate means of implementing the Fourteenth Amendment overrides the State’s Eleventh Amendment rights, see, e. g., Fitzpatrick v. Bitzer, supra, 427 U. S., at 453, 456; Katzenbach v. Morgan, 384 U. S. 641, 648-650 (1966). We hold that the authorization of attorneys’ fees to be awarded under the standards set forth above is an appropriate way to achieve the competing goals described above.” (Emphasis in original.) 594 F. 2d, at 342-343.

       Petitioner ignores the fact that respondent did allege constitutional claims which the District Court and the Court of Appeals both found to be sufficiently substantial to support federal jurisdiction under Hagans v. Lavine, 415 U. S. 528. Under these circumstances petitioner could not have prevailed on his statutory argument even if the Court had reached the opposite result in Thihoutot. See n. 15, infra.

       The jurisdictional statute at issue in Chapman, 28 U. S. C. § 1343, specifically limits district court jurisdiction to cases in which the plaintiff alleges a violation of a right secured by the Constitution or by a federal statute “providing for equal rights” or “civil rights.” Inasmuch as it does not create substantive rights at all, but merely provides a remedy for the violation of rights conferred by the Constitution or other statutes, § 1983 does not fall within the category of statutes providing for equal rights or civil rights. Therefore, there is not automatically federal jurisdiction under § 1343 whenever a plaintiff files a § 1983 claim; rather, the court must look to the underlying substantive right that was allegedly violated to determine whether that right was conferred by the Constitution or by a civil rights statute.
      Section 1988 does not contain language like that in § 1343. Rather, § 1988 provides that attorney’s fees may be awarded to the prevailing party “[i]n any action or proceeding to enforce [§ 1983].” Although the reference to actions “to enforce” § 1983 is somewhat imprecise in light of the fact that § 1983 does not itself create substantive rights, the legislative history makes it perfectly clear that the Act was intended to apply in any action for which § 1983 provides a remedy. See Maine v. Thiboutot, ante, at 9-10.

         The Eleventh Amendment provides:
      “The Judicial power of the United States shall not be construed to extend to any suit in law or equity, commenced or prosecuted against one of the United States by Citizens of another State, or by Citizens or Subjects of any Foreign State.”
      The Eleventh Amendment issue was not before the Court in Thiboutot because that case involved an award of fees by a state court pursuant to § 1988. Ante, at 9, n. 7.

       “The Congress shall have power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article.”

       Referring to the argument of the Attorney General, we said:
      “[H]e argues that these plain indications of legislative intent are not enough. In his view, Congress must enact express statutory language making the States hable if it wishes to abrogate their immunity. The Attorney General points out that this Court has sometimes refused to impose retroactive liability on the States in the absence of an extraordinarily explicit statutory mandate. See Employees v. Missouri Public Health & Welfare Dept., 411 U. S. 279; see also Edelman v. Jordan, 415 U. S. 651. But these cases concern retroactive liability for prelitigation conduct rather than expenses incurred in litigation seeking only prospective relief.
      “The Act imposes attorney’s fees ‘as part of the costs.’ Costs have traditionally been awarded without regard for the States’ Eleventh Amendment immunity. The practice of awarding costs against the States goes back to 1849 in this Court. See Missouri v. Iowa, 7 How. 660, 681; North Dakota v. Minnesota, 263 U. S. 583 (collecting cases). The Court has never viewed the Eleventh Amendment as barring such awards, even in suits between States and individual litigants.
      “In Fairmont Creamery Co. v. Minnesota, 275 U. S. 70, the State challenged this Court’s award of costs, but we squarely rejected the State’s claim of immunity. Far from requiring an explicit abrogation of state immunity, we relied on a statutory mandate that was entirely silent on the question of state liability. The power to make the award was supported by ‘the inherent authority of the Court in the orderly administration of justice as between all parties litigant.’ Id., at 74. A federal court’s interest in orderly, expeditious proceedings ‘justifies [it] in treating the state just as any other litigant and in imposing costs upon it’ when an award is called for. Id., at 77.
      “Just as a federal court may treat a State like any other litigant when it assesses costs, so also may Congress amend its definition of taxable costs and have the amended class of costs apply to the States, as it does to all other litigants, without expressly stating that it intends to abrogate the States’ Eleventh Amendment immunity. For it would be absurd to require an express reference to state litigants whenever a filing fee, or a new item, such as an expert witness’ fees, is added to the category of taxable costs.” 437 U. S., at 696-697 (footnotes omitted).

       The legislative history makes it clear that Congress intended fees to be awarded where a pendent constitutional claim is involved, even if the statutory claim on which the plaintiff prevailed is one for which fees cannot be awarded under the Act. The Report of the Committee on the Judiciary of the House of' Representatives accompanying H. R. 15460, a bill substantially identical to the Senate bill that was finally enacted, stated:
      “To the extent a plaintiff joins a claim under one of the statutes enumerated in H. R. 15460 with a claim that does not allow attorney fees, that plaintiff, if it prevails on the non-fee claim, is entitled to a determination on the other claim for the purpose of awarding counsel fees. Morales v. Haines, 486 F. 2d 880 (7th Cir. 1073). In some instances, however, the claim with fees may involve a constitutional question which the courts are reluctant to resolve if the non-constitutional claim is dispositive. Hagans v. Lavine, 415 U. S. 528 (1974). In such cases, if the claim for which fees may be awarded meets the 'substantiality’ test, see Hagans v. Lavine, supra; United Mine Workers v. Gibbs, 383 U. S. 715 (1966), attorney’s fees may be allowed even though the court declines to enter judgment for the plaintiff on that claim, so long as the plaintiff prevails on the non-fee claim arising out of a 'common nucleus of operative fact.' United Mine Workers v. Gibbs, supra, at 725.” H. R. Rep. No. 94-1558, p. 4, n. 7 (1976).

       Petitioner seeks to distinguish this case from Hutto v. Finney on the ground that Hutto involved an adjudication of a constitutional violation, rather than a statutory violation. However, as Mr. Justice Rehnquist noted in his dissent, 437 U. S., at 717-718, the underlying claim in Hutto was predicated on the Eighth Amendment as made applicable to the States by the Fourteenth Amendment rather than on any substantive provision of the Fourteenth Amendment itself. The prisoners’ claim in Hutto was therefore arguably more analogous to the statutory claim involved in this ease than to the constitutional claims asserted here or to the equal protection claim asserted in Fitzpatrick v. Bitzer, 427 U. S. 445.