[50] As the plurality in Pembaur recognized, special difficulties can arise when it is contended that a municipal policymaker has delegated his policymaking authority to another official.475 U.S. at 482-483, and n. 12. If the mere exercise of discretion by an employee could give rise to a constitutional violation, the result would be indistinguishable from respondeat superior liability. If, however, a city's lawful policymakers could insulate the government from liability simply by delegating their policymaking authority to others, § 1983 could not serve its intended purpose. It may not be possible to draw an

[ 485 U.S. Page 127]

elegant line that will resolve this conundrum, but certain principles should provide useful guidance.

[51] First, whatever analysis is used to identify municipal policymakers, egregious attempts by local government to insulate themselves from liability for unconstitutional policies are precluded by a separate doctrine. Relying on the language of § 1983, the Court has long recognized that a plaintiff may be able to prove the existence of a widespread practice that, although not authorized by written law or express municipal policy, is "so permanent and well settled as to constitute a custom or usage' with the force of law." Adickes v. S. H. Kress & Co.,398 U.S. 144, 167-168 (1970). That principle, which has not been affected by Monell or subsequent cases, ensures that most deliberate municipal evasions of the Constitution will be sharply limited.

[52] Second, as the Pembaur plurality recognized, the authority to make municipal policy is necessarily the authority to make final policy.475 U.S. at 481-484. When an official's discretionary decisions are constrained by policies not of that official's making, those policies, rather than the subordinate's departures from them, are the act of the municipality. Similarly, when a subordinate's decision is subject to review by the municipality's authorized policymakers, they have retained the authority to measure the official's conduct for conformance with their policies. If the authorized policymakers approve a subordinate's decision and the basis for it, their ratification would be chargeable to the municipality because their decision is final.

[53] C

[54] Whatever refinements of these principles may be suggested in the future, we have little difficulty concluding that the Court of Appeals applied an incorrect legal standard in this case. In reaching this conclusion, we do not decide whether the First Amendment forbade the city from retaliating against respondent for having taken advantage of the grievance mechanism in 1980. Nor do we decide whether there

[ 485 U.S. Page 128]

was evidence in this record from which a rational jury could conclude either that such retaliation actually occurred or that respondent suffered any compensable injury from whatever retaliatory action may have been taken. Finally, we do not address petitioner's contention that the jury verdict exonerating the individual defendants cannot be reconciled with the verdict against the city. Even assuming that all these issues were properly resolved in respondent's favor, we would not be able to affirm the decision of the Court of Appeals.

[55] The city cannot be held liable under § 1983 unless respondent proved the existence of an unconstitutional municipal policy. Respondent does not contend that anyone in city government ever promulgated, or even articulated, such a policy. Nor did he attempt to prove that such retaliation was ever directed against anyone other than himself. Respondent contends that the record can be read to establish that his supervisors were angered by his 1980 appeal to the Civil Service Commission; that new supervisors in a new administration chose, for reasons passed on through some informal means, to retaliate against respondent two years later by transferring him to another agency; and that this transfer was part of a scheme that led, another year and a half later, to his lay off. Even if one assumes that all this was true, it says nothing about the actions of those whom the law established as the makers of municipal policy in matters of personnel administration. The mayor and aldermen enacted no ordinance designed to retaliate against respondent or against similarly situated employees. On the contrary, the city established an independent Civil Service Commission and empowered it to review and correct improper personnel actions. Respondent does not deny that his repeated appeals from adverse personnel decisions repeatedly brought him at least partial relief, and the Civil Service Commission never so much as hinted that retaliatory transfers or lay offs were permissible. Respondent points to no evidence indicating that the Commission delegated to anyone its final authority to

[ 485 U.S. Page 129]

interpret and enforce the following policy set out in article XVIII of the city's Charter, § 2(a), App. 49:

[56] "Merit and fitness. All appointments and promotions to positions in the service of the city and all measures for the control and regulation of employment in such positions, and separation therefrom, shall be on the sole basis of merit and fitness . . . ."

[57] The Court of Appeals concluded that "appointing authorities," like Hamsher and Killen, who had the authority to initiate transfers and layoffs, were municipal "policymakers." The court based this conclusion on its findings (1) that the decisions of these employees were not individually reviewed for "substantive propriety" by higher supervisory officials; and (2) that the Civil Service Commission decided appeals from such decisions, if at all, in a circumscribed manner that gave substantial deference to the original decisionmaker.798 F.2d, at 1174-1175. We find these propositions insufficient to support the conclusion that Hamsher and Killen were authorized to establish employment policy for the city with respect to transfers and layoffs. To the contrary, the City Charter expressly states that the Civil Service Commission has the power and the duty:

[58] "To consider and determine any matter involved in the administration and enforcement of this [Civil Service] article and the rules and ordinances adopted in accordance therewith that may be referred to it for decision by the director [or personnel], or on appeal by any appointing authority, employe, or taxpayer of the city, from any act of the director or of any appointing authority. The decision of the commission in all such matters shall be final, subject, however, to any right of action under any law of the state or of the United States." St. Louis City Charter, art. XVIII, § 7(d), App. 63.

[59] This case therefore resembles the hypothetical example in Pembaur: "If [city] employment policy was set by the

[ 485 U.S. Page 130]

[Mayor and Aldermen and by the Civil Service Commission], only [those] bod[ies'] decisions would provide a basis for [city] liability. This would be true even if the [mayor and aldermen and the Commission] left the [appointing authorities] discretion to hire and fire employees and [they] exercised that discretion in an unconstitutional manner . . . ." 475 U.S. at 483, n. 12. A majority of the Court of Appeals panel determined that the Civil Service Commission's review of individual employment actions gave too much deference to the decisions of appointing authorities like Hamsher and Killen. Simply going along with discretionary decisions made by one's subordinates, however, is not a delegation to them of the authority to make policy. It is equally consistent with a presumption that the subordinates are faithfully attempting to comply with the policies that are supposed to guide them. It would be a different matter if a particular decision by a subordinate was cast in the form of a policy statement and expressly approved by the supervising policymaker. It would also be a different matter if a series of decisions by a subordinate official manifested a "custom or usage" of which the supervisor must have been aware. See supra, at 127. In both those cases, the supervisor could realistically be deemed to have adopted a policy that happened to have been formulated or initiated by a lower-ranking official. But the mere failure to investigate the basis of a subordinate's discretionary decisions does not amount to a delegation of policymaking authority, especially where (as here) the wrongfulness of the subordinate's decision arises from a retaliatory motive or other unstated rationale. In such circumstances, the purposes of § 1983 would not be served by treating a subordinate employees' decision as if it were a reflection of municipal policy.

[60] JUSTICE BRENNAN's opinion, concurring in the judgment, finds implications in our discussion that we do not think necessary or correct. See post, at 142-147. We nowhere say or imply, for example, that "a municipal charter's precatory

[ 485 U.S. Page 131]

admonition against discrimination or any other employment practice not based on merit and fitness effectively insulates the municipality from any liability based on acts inconsistent with that policy." Post, at 145, n. 7. Rather, we would respect the decisions, embodied in state and local law, that allocated policymaking authority among particular individuals and bodies. Refusals to carry out stated policies could obviously help to show that a municipality's actual policies were different from the ones that had been announced. If such a showing were made, we would be confronted with a different case than the one we decide today.

[61] Nor do we believe that we have left a "gaping hole" in § 1983 that needs to be filled with the vague concept of "de facto final policymaking authority." Post, at 144. Except perhaps as a step towards overruling Monell and adopting the doctrine of respondeat superior, ad hoc searches for officials possessing such "de facto" authority would serve primarily to foster needless unpredictability in the application of § 1983.

[62] IV

[63] We cannot accept either the Court of Appeals' broad definition of municipal policymakers or respondent's suggestion that a jury should be entitled to define for itself which officials' decisions should expose a municipality to liability. Respondent has suggested that the record will support an inference that policymaking authority was in fact delegated to individuals who took retaliatory action against him and who were not exonerated by the jury. Respondent's arguments appear to depend on a legal standard similar to the one suggested in JUSTICE STEVENS' dissenting opinion, post, at 171, which we do not accept. Our examination of the record and state law, however, suggests that further review of this case may be warranted in light of the principles we have discussed. That task is best left to the Court of Appeals, which will be free to invite additional briefing and argument if necessary. Accordingly, the decision of the Court of Appeals is

[ 485 U.S. Page 132]

reversed, and the case is remanded for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.

[64] If is so ordered.

[65] JUSTICE KENNEDY took no part in the consideration or decision of this case.

[66] Disposition

[67] 798 F.2d 1168, reversed and remanded.

[68] JUSTICE BRENNAN, with whom JUSTICE MARSHALL and JUSTICE BLACKMUN join, concurring.

[69] Despite its somewhat confusing procedural background, this case at bottom presents a relatively straightforward question: whether respondent's supervisor at the Community Development Agency, Frank Hamsher, possessed the authority to establish final employment policy for the city of St. Louis such that the city can be held liable under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 for Hamsher's allegedly unlawful decision to transfer respondent to a dead-end job. Applying the test set out two Terms ago by the plurality in Pembaur v. Cincinnati,475 U.S. 469 (1986), I conclude that Hamsher did not possess such authority and I therefore concur in the Court's judgment reversing the decision below. I write separately, however, because I believe that the commendable desire of today's plurality to "define more precisely when a decision on a single occasion may be enough" to subject a municipality to § 1983 liability, ante, at 123, has led it to embrace a theory of municipal liability that is both unduly narrow and unrealistic, and one that ultimately would permit municipalities to insulate themselves from liability for the acts of all but a small minority of actual city policymakers.

[70] I

[71] Respondent James H. Praprotnik worked for petitioner City of St. Louis for 15 years. A licensed architect, he began his career in 1968 as city planner and by 1980 had risen to a mid-level management position in the city's Community Development Agency (CDA), garnering consistently high job evaluations, substantial pay raises, and rapid promotions

[ 485 U.S. Page 133]

the intervening 12 years. 1980, however, marked the turning point in respondent's fortunes as a civil servant. In April of that year, his supervisor, Charles Kindleberger, suspended him for 15 days for failing to comply with a secondary employment policy that required all city professionals to obtain prior approval before undertaking any outside work. Respondent, who had objected to the policy since the head of the agency, CDA Director Donald Spaid, first announced it in 1978, appealed the suspension to the city's Civil Service Commission (CSC), arguing that the advance approval requirement was an improper invasion of his privacy and that in any event he had consistently complied with it. Although the Commission apparently did not question the validity of the policy, it found the penalty excessive, and therefore directed respondent's supervisors to reinstate him with backpay and to issue a letter of reprimand in lieu of the suspension.

[72] Testimony at the trial below revealed that neither Spaid nor Kindleberger was pleased with respondent's actions, and that Spaid in particular was "very down on" respondent for his testimony before the CSC. 3 Record 1-54 to 1-55, 5 id., at 3-237. In October 1980, just before the Commission rendered its decision, Kindleberger gave respondent an overall rating of "good" for the year, but recommended a two-step decrease in his salary. Kindleberger, who had just six months earlier proposed raising respondent's salary two grades, justified the reduction as part of a city-wide pay scale reorganization. Respondent, however, viewed the recommendation as retaliation for his CSC appeal and petitioned the Department of Personnel for relief; the department, which considers initial challenges to all performance ratings, granted partial relief, approving a one-step reduction, and the CSC affirmed this disposition on final appeal.

[73] The following year witnessed a change in city administrations and the arrival of Frank Hamsher, who succeeded Spaid as CDA Director. Kindleberger, however, remained the supervisor responsible for respondent's performance

[ 485 U.S. Page 134]

evaluation, and in October 1981 he rated respondent merely "adequate" overall. A confidential memorandum from one of respondent's superiors to Kindleberger explained that respondent did not get along well with others, citing as an example respondent's prior difficulties with former Director Spaid. Respondent, who had previously never received a rating of less than "good," again appealed to the Department of Personnel, which again ordered partial relief.

[74] Six months later CDA underwent major budget and staff reductions and, as part of the resulting reorganization, Director Hamsher proposed transferring respondent's duties to the Heritage and Urban Design Commission (Heritage) and consolidating his functions with those of a vacant position at Heritage. Although there was testimony indicating that Heritage Commissioner Henry Jackson thought the transfer unnecessary, both Jackson and his superior, Director of Public Safety Thomas Nash, agreed to the consolidation, and the Director of Personnel formally approved the proposal. Respondent objected to the move and appealed to the CSC, but the Commission declined to review the decision, reasoning that because Heritage classified the consolidated position at the same grade as respondent's former job, the transfer was merely "lateral" and respondent had therefore suffered no "adverse" employment action. Thereafter, respondent filed this § 1983 suit against the city, Kindleberger, Hamsher, and Hamsher's successor at CDA, Deborah Patterson, alleging that the transfer violated his constitutional rights.*fn1

[75] In the meantime, Jackson took over many of the architectural tasks CDA had ostensibly transferred to the new position and assigned respondent mainly clerical duties, an arrangement the latter found highly unsatisfactory. In November 1982, Jackson rated respondent "inadequate" overall and recommended a one-step reduction in his salary, as well

[ 485 U.S. Page 135]

as an overall reduction in the classification of his position. Respondent successfully appealed his performance rating to the Personnel Department, which again granted partial relief. Nonetheless, in March 1983 his position was substantially downgraded and by the summer of that year Jackson's successor at Heritage, Robert Killen, proposed abolishing the position altogether. In December 1983, Killen carried through on his plan and, with the approval of Public Safety Director Nash, laid respondent off. Respondent amended his complaint in the District Court to reflect the layoff and simultaneously appealed the action to the CSC, but the Commission stayed its proceedings in light of the pendency of this lawsuit.

[76] At trial, respondent sought to prove that the individual defendants had transferred him and eventually laid him off in retaliation for his use of the city's grievance machinery, thereby violating his First Amendment and Due Process rights. For its part, the city contended that the individual defendants were not personally responsible for the alleged ills that had befallen respondent. Conspicuous by their absence, city counsel argued, were Donald Spaid, whose displeasure over respondent's testimony before the CSC was allegedly the motivating force behind respondent's first proposed grade reduction and allegedly infected later performance evaluations; Robert Killen, who initiated and ultimately authorized the elimination of respondent's position at Heritage; and Thomas Nash, who approved the layoff. Respondent's counsel, however, defended the choice of defendants as those "primarily responsible" for the constitutional deprivations. 6 id., at 4-56.

[77] The District Court instructed the jury that generally a city is not liable under § 1983 for the acts of its employees, but that it may be held to answer for constitutional wrongs "committed by an official high enough in the government so that his or her actions can be said to represent a government decision." App. 113. In a lengthy and involved instruction, the court further advised the jury that it must find in favor of

[ 485 U.S. Page 136]

respondent, and against the individual defendants, if it found six facts to be true, one of which was that "Hamsher and Kindleberger were personally involved in causing [respondent's] transfer and/or layoff." Id., at 118. The jury exonerated the three individual defendants, but awarded respondent $15,000 on each of his constitutional claims against petitioner.

[78] The Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit vacated the judgment entered on respondent's Due Process claim (a ruling not at issue here) but affirmed the judgment as to the First Amendment claim.798 F.2d 1168 (1986). With respect to this latter claim, the court reasoned that the city could be held accountable for an improperly motivated transfer and layoff if it had delegated to the responsible officials, either directly or indirectly, the authority to act on behalf of the city, and if the decisions made within the scope of this delegated authority were essentially final. Applying this test, the court noted that under the City Charter, "appointing authorities," or department heads, such as Hamsher could undertake transfers and layoffs subject only to the approval of the Director of Personnel, who undertook no substantive review of such decisions and simply conditioned his approval on formal compliance with city procedures. Moreover, because the CSC engaged in highly circumscribed and deferential review of layoffs and, at least so far as this case reveals, no review whatever of lateral transfers, the court concluded that an appointing authority's transfer and layoff decisions were final. Id., at 1174-1175.

[79] Having found that Hamsher was a final policymaker whose acts could subject petitioner to § 1983 liability, the court determined that the jury had ample evidence from which it could find that Hamsher transferred respondent in retaliation for the latter's exercise of his First Amendment rights, and that the transfer in turn precipitated respondent's layoff. This constructive discharge theory, the majority found, also reconciled the jury's apparently inconsistent verdicts: the

[ 485 U.S. Page 137]

jury could have viewed Hamsher's unlawful motivation as the proximate cause of respondent's dismissal but, because Nash and Killen administered the final blows, it could have concluded that Hamsher, Kindleberger, and Patterson were not "personally involved" in the layoff as required by the instructions; accordingly, the jury could have reasonably exonerated the individual defendants while finding the city liable. Id., at 1176, and n. 8.*fn2

[80] II

[81] In light of the jury instructions below, the central question before us is whether the city delegated to CDA Director Frank Hamsher the authority to establish final employment policy for the city respecting transfers. For if it did not, then his allegedly unlawful decision to move respondent to an unfulfilling, dead-end position is simply not an act for which the city can be held responsible under § 1983. I am constrained to conclude that Hamsher possessed no such policymaking power here, and that, on the contrary, his allegedly retaliatory act simply constituted an abuse of the discretionary authority the city had entrusted to him.

[82] The scope of Hamsher's authority with respect to transfers derives its significance from our determination in Monell v. New York City Dept. of Social Services,436 U.S. 658 (1978), that a municipality is not liable under § 1983 for each and every wrong committed by its employees. In rejecting the concept of vicarious municipal liability, we emphasized that

[ 485 U.S. Page 138]

"the touchstone of the § 1983 action against a government body is an allegation that official policy is responsible for the deprivation of rights protected by the Constitution." Id., at 690. More recently we have explained that the touchstone of "official policy" is designed "to distinguish acts of the municipality from acts of employees of the municipality, and thereby making clear that municipal liability is limited to action for which the municipality is actually responsible." Pembaur v. Cincinnati,475 U.S. at 479-480 (emphasis in original).

[83] Municipalities, of course, conduct much of the business of governing through human agents. Where those agents act in accordance with formal policies, or pursuant to informal practices "so permanent and well settled as to constitute a custom or usage' with the force of law," Adickes v. S. H. Kress & Co.,398 U.S. 144, 167-168 (1970), we naturally ascribe their acts to the municipalities themselves and hold the latter responsible for any resulting constitutional deprivations. Monell, which involved a challenge to a city-wide policy requiring all pregnant employees to take unpaid leave after their fifth month of pregnancy, was just such a case. Nor have we ever doubted that a single decision of a city's properly constituted legislative body is a municipal act capable of subjecting the city to liability. See, e.g., Newport v. Fact Concerts, Inc.,453 U.S. 247 (1981) (city council canceled concert permit for content-based reasons); Owen v. City of Independence, 445 U.S. 622 (1980) (city council passed resolution firing police chief without any pretermination hearing). In these cases we neither required nor, as the plurality suggests, assumed that these decisions reflected generally applicable "policies" as that term is commonly understood, because it was perfectly obvious that the actions of the municipalities' policymaking organs, whether isolated or not, were properly charged to the municipalities themselves.*fn3

[ 485 U.S. Page 139]

And, in Pembaur we recognized that "the power to establish policy is no more the exclusive province of the legislature at the local level than at the state or national level,"475 U.S. at 480, and that the isolated decision of an executive municipal policymaker, therefore, could likewise give rise to municipal liability under § 1983.

[84] In concluding that Frank Hamsher was a policymaker, the Court of Appeals relied on the fact that the City had delegated to him "the authority, either directly or indirectly, to act on [its] behalf," and that his decisions within the scope of this delegated authority were effectively final.798 F.2d, at 1174. In Pembaur, however, we made clear that a municipality is not liable merely because the official who inflicted the constitutional injury had the final authority to act on its behalf; rather, as four of us explained, the official in question must possess "final authority to establish municipal policy with respect to the [challenged] action."475 U.S. at 481. Thus, we noted, "the fact that a particular official -- even a policymaking official -- has discretion in the exercise of particular functions does not, without more, give rise to municipal

[ 485 U.S. Page 140]

liability based on an exercise of that discretion." Id., at 481-482. By way of illustration, we explained that if, in a given county, the Board of County Commissioners established county employment policy and delegated to the County Sheriff alone the discretion to hire and fire employees, the county itself would not be liable if the Sheriff exercised this authority in an unconstitutional manner, because "the decision to act unlawfully would not be a decision of the Board." Id., at 483, n. 12. We pointed out, however, that in that same county the Sheriff could be the final policymaker in other areas, such as law enforcement practices, and that if so, his or her decisions in such matters could give rise to municipal liability. Ibid. In short, just as in Owen and Fact Concerts we deemed it fair to hold municipalities liable for the isolated, unconstitutional acts of their legislative bodies, regardless of whether those acts were meant to establish generally applicable "policies," so too in Pembaur four of us concluded that it is equally appropriate to hold municipalities accountable for the isolated constitutional injury inflicted by an executive final municipal policymaker, even though the decision giving rise to the injury is not intended to govern future situations. In either case, as long as the contested decision is made in an area over which the official or legislative body could establish a final policy capable of governing future municipal conduct, it is both fair and consistent with the purposes of § 1983 to treat the decision as that of the municipality itself, and to hold it liable for the resulting constitutional deprivation.

[85] In my view, Pembaur controls this case. As an "appointing authority," Hamsher was empowered under the City Charter to initiate lateral transfers such as the one challenged here, subject to the approval of both the Director of Personnel and the appointing authority of the transferee agency. The Charter, however, nowhere confers upon

[ 485 U.S. Page 141]

agency heads any authority to establish city policy, final or otherwise, with respect to such transfers. Thus, for example, Hamsher was not authorized to promulgate binding guidelines or criteria governing how or when lateral transfers were to be accomplished. Nor does the record reveal that he in fact sought to exercise any such authority in these matters. There is no indication, for example, that Hamsher ever purported to institute or announce a practice of general applicability concerning transfers. Instead, the evidence discloses but one transfer decision -- the one involving respondent -- which Hamsher ostensibly undertook pursuant to a city-wide program of fiscal restraint and budgetary reductions. At most, then, the record demonstrates that Hamsher had the authority to determine how best to effectuate a policy announced by his superiors, rather than the power to establish that policy. Like the hypothetical Sheriff in Pembaur's footnote 12, Hamsher had discretionary authority to transfer CDA employees laterally; that he may have used this authority to punish respondent for the exercise of his First Amendment rights does not, without more, render the city liable for respondent's resulting constitutional injury.*fn4 The court below did not suggest that either Killen or Nash, who together orchestrated respondent's ultimate layoff,

[ 485 U.S. Page 142]

shared Hamsher's constitutionally impermissible animus. Because the court identified only one unlawfully motivated municipal employee involved in respondent's transfer and layoff, and because that employee did not possess final policymaking authority with respect to the contested decision,*fn5 the city may not be held accountable for any constitutional wrong respondent may have suffered.

[86] III

[87] These determinations, it seems to me, are sufficient to dispose of this case, and I therefore think it unnecessary to decide, as the plurality does, who the actual policymakers in St. Louis are. I question more than the mere necessity of these determinations, however, for I believe that in the course of passing on issues not before us, the plurality announces legal principles that are inconsistent with our earlier cases and unduly restrict the reach of § 1983 in cases involving municipalities.

[88] The plurality begins its assessment of St. Louis' power structure by asserting that the identification of policymaking officials is a question of state law, by which it means that the question is neither one of federal law nor of fact, at least "not in the usual sense." See ante, at 124. Instead, the plurality explains, courts are to identify municipal policymakers

[ 485 U.S. Page 143]

by referring exclusively to applicable state statutory law. Ante, at 124. Not surprisingly, the plurality cites no authority for this startling proposition, nor could it, for we have never suggested that municipal liability should be determined in so formulaic and unrealistic a fashion. In any case in which the policymaking authority of a municipal tortfeasor is in doubt, state law will naturally be the appropriate starting point, but ultimately the factfinder must determine where such policymaking authority actually resides, and not simply "where the applicable law purports to put it." Ante, at 126. As the plurality itself acknowledges, local governing bodies may take myriad forms. We in no way slight the dignity of municipalities by recognizing that in not a few of them real and apparent authority may diverge, and that in still others state statutory law will simply fail to disclose where such authority ultimately rests. Indeed, in upholding the Court of Appeals' determination in Pembaur that the County Prosecutor was a policymaking official with respect to county law enforcement practices, a majority of this Court relied on testimony which revealed that the County Sheriff's office routinely forwarded certain matters to the Prosecutor and followed his instructions in those areas. See475 U.S. at 485; ibid. (WHITE, J., concurring); id., at 491 (O'CONNOR, J., concurring). While the majority splintered into three separate camps on the ultimate theory of municipal liability, and the case generated five opinions in all, not a single member of the Court suggested that reliance on such extra-statutory evidence of the county's actual allocation of policymaking authority was in any way improper. Thus, although I agree with the plurality that juries should not be given open-ended "discretion to determine which officials are high enough in the government that their actions can be said to represent a decision of the government itself," ante, at 126 (emphasis added), juries can and must find the predicate facts necessary to a determination of whether a given official possesses final policymaking authority. While the jury instructions in this case were regrettably vague, the plurality's solution tosses

[ 485 U.S. Page 144]

the baby out with the bath water. The identification of municipal policymakers is an essentially factual determination "in the usual sense," and is therefore rightly entrusted to a properly instructed jury.

[89] Nor does the "custom or usage" doctrine adequately compensate for the inherent inflexibility of a rule that leaves the identification of policymakers exclusively to state statutory law. That doctrine, under which municipalities and States can be held liable for unconstitutional practices so well settled and permanent that they have the force of law, see Adickes v. Kress & Co.,398 U.S. at 167, has little if any bearing on the question whether a city has delegated de facto final policymaking authority to a given official. A city practice of delegating final policymaking authority to a subordinate or mid-level official would not be unconstitutional in and of itself, and an isolated unconstitutional act by an official entrusted with such authority would obviously not amount to a municipal "custom or usage." Under Pembaur, of course, such an isolated act should give rise to municipal liability. Yet a case such as this would fall through the gaping hole the plurality's construction leaves in § 1983, because the state statutory law would not identify the municipal actor as a policymaking official, and a single constitutional deprivation, by definition, is not a well settled and permanent municipal practice carrying the force of law.*fn6

[90] For these same reasons, I cannot subscribe to the plurality's narrow and overly rigid view of when a municipal official's policymaking authority is "final." Attempting to place a gloss on Pembaur's finality requirement, the plurality suggests that whenever the decision of an official are subject to

[ 485 U.S. Page 145]

some form or review -- however limited -- that official's decisions are non-final. Under the plurality's theory, therefore, even where an official wields policymaking authority with respect to a challenged decision, the city would not be liable for that official's policy decision unless reviewing officials affirmatively approved both the "decision and the basis for it." Ante, at 127. Reviewing officials, however, may as a matter of practice never invoke their plenary oversight authority, or their review powers may be highly circumscribed. See n. 4, supra. Under such circumstances, the subordinate's decision is in effect the final municipal pronouncement on the subject. Certainly a § 1983 plaintiff is entitled to place such considerations before the jury, for the law is concerned not with the niceties of legislative draftsmanship but with the realities of municipal decisionmaking, and any assessment of a municipality's actual power structure is necessarily a factual and practical one.*fn7

[91] Accordingly, I cannot endorse the plurality's determination, based on nothing more than its own review of the City Charter, that the mayor, the aldermen, and the CSC are the only policymakers for the city of St. Louis. While these officials

[ 485 U.S. Page 146]

may well have policymaking authority, that hardly ends the matter; the question before us is whether the officials responsible for respondent's allegedly unlawful transfer were final policymakers. As I have previously indicated, I do not believe that CDA Director Frank Hamsher possessed any policymaking authority with respect to lateral transfers and thus I do not believe that his allegedly improper decision to transfer respondent could, without more, give rise to municipal liability. Although the plurality reaches the same result, it does so by reasoning that because others could have reviewed the decisions of Hamsher and Killen, the latter officials simply could not have been final policymakers.

[92] This analysis, however, turns a blind eye to reality, for it ignores not only the lower court's determination, nowhere disputed, that CSC review was highly circumscribed and deferential, but that in this very case the Commission refused to judge a propriety of Hamsher's transfer decision because a lateral transfer was not an "adverse" employment action falling within its jurisdiction. Nor does the plurality account for the fact that Hamsher's predecessor, Donald Spaid, promulgated what the city readily acknowledges was a binding policy regarding secondary employment;*fn8 although the CSC ultimately modified the sanctions respondent suffered as a result of his apparent failure to comply with that policy, the record is devoid of any suggestion that the Commission reviewed the substance or validity of the policy itself. Under the plurality's analysis, therefore, even the hollowest promise of review is sufficient to divest all city officials save the mayor and governing legislative body of final policymaking authority. While clarity and ease of application may

[ 485 U.S. Page 147]

commend such a rule, we have remained steadfast in our conviction that Congress intended to hold municipalities accountable for those constitutional injuries inflicted not only by their lawmakers, but "by those whose edicts or acts may fairly be said to represent official policy." Monell,436 U.S. at 694. Because the plurality's mechanical "finality" test is fundamentally at odds with the pragmatic and factual inquiry contemplated by Monell, I cannot join what I perceive to be its unwarranted abandonment of the traditional factfinding process in § 1983 actions involving municipalities.

[93] Finally, I think it necessary to emphasize that despite certain language in the plurality opinion suggesting otherwise, the Court today need not and therefore does not decide that a city can only be held liable under § 1983 where the plaintiff "prov[es] the existence of an unconstitutional municipal policy." See ante, at 128. Just last Term, we left open for the second time the question whether a city can be subjected to liability for a policy that, while not unconstitutional in and of itself, may give rise to constitutional deprivations. See Springfield v. Kibbe,480 U.S. 257 (1987); see also Oklahoma City v. Tuttle, 471 U.S. 808 (1985). That question is certainly not presented by this case, and nothing we say today forecloses its future consideration.

[94] IV

[95] For the reasons stated above, I concur in the judgment of the Court reversing the decision below and remanding the case so that the Court of Appeals may determine whether respondent's layoff resulted from the actions of any improperly motivated final policymakers.

[96] JUSTICE STEVENS, dissenting.

[97] If this case involved nothing more than a personal vendetta between a municipal employee and his superiors, it would be quite wrong to impose liability on the City of St. Louis. In fact, however, the jury found that top officials in the City administration, relying on pretextual grounds, had taken a series

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of retaliatory actions against respondent because he had testified truthfully on two occasions, one relating to personnel policy and the other involving a public controversy of importance to the Mayor and the members of his cabinet. No matter how narrowly the Court may define the standards for imposing liability upon municipalities in § 1983 litigation, the judgment entered by the District Court in this case should be affirmed.

[98] In order to explain why I believe that affirmance is required by this Court's precedents,*fn1 it is necessary to begin with a more complete statement of the disputed factual issues that the jury resolved in respondent's favor, and then to comment on the procedural posture of the case. Finally, I shall discuss the special importance of the character of the wrongful conduct disclosed by this record.

[99] I

[100] The City of St. Louis hired respondent as a licensed architect in 1968. During the ensuing decade, he was repeatedly

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promoted and consistently given "superior" performance ratings. In April of 1980, while serving as the Director of Urban Design in the Community Development Agency (CDA), he was recommended for a two-step salary increase by his immediate superior. See 3 Record 1-51.

[101] Thereafter, on two occasions he gave public testimony that was critical of official City policy. In 1980 he testified before the Civil Service Commission (CSC) in support of his successful appeal from a 15-day suspension. In that testimony he explained that he had received advance oral approval of his outside employment and voiced his objections to the requirement of prior written approval.*fn2 The record demonstrates

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that this testimony offended his immediate superiors at the CDA.*fn3

[102] In 1981 respondent testified before the Heritage and Urban Design Commission (HUD) in connection with a proposal

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to acquire a controversial rusting steel sculpture by Richard Serra. In his testimony he revealed the previously undisclosed fact that an earlier City administration had rejected an offer to acquire the same sculpture, and also explained that the erection of the sculpture would require the removal of structures on which the City had recently expended about $250,000.*fn4 This testimony offended top officials

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of the City government, possibly including the Mayor, who supported the acquisition of the Serra sculpture, as well as respondent's agency superiors.*fn5 They made it perfectly

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clear that they believed that respondent had violated a duty of loyalty to the Mayor by expressing his personal opinion about the sculpture. Thus, defendant Hamsher testified:

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"Im not fond of the sculpture and wasn't then. But the mayor was elected by the people and he made the decision. He was going to support the installation of the sculpture.

[103] "Therefore, it was my responsibility and the responsibility of others who worked for my agency to do so

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as well and not to express personal opinions in public forums about what that sculpture was going to be and what it would look like." 5 id., at 3-180.

[104] Defendant Kindleberger made the same point:

[105] "Well, I think the obligation for a senior management individual is to represent fairly the position of his boss which, in our case, happens to be the mayor. And I would -- I just think that is something that is appropriate for senior management to do." 5 id., at 3-250.

[106] After this testimony respondent was the recipient of a series of adverse personnel actions that culminated in his transfer from an important management level professional position to a rather menial assignment for which he was "grossly over qualified," 3 id., at 1-80, and his eventual layoff.*fn6 In

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preparing respondent's service ratings after the Serra sculpture incident, his superiors followed a "highly unusual" procedure that may have violated the City's personnel regulations.*fn7 Moreover, management officials who were involved in implementing the decision to transfer respondent to a menial assignment made it clear that "there was no reason" for the transfer -- except, it would seem, for the possible connection

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with "the Serra sculpture incident."*fn8 It is equally clear that the City's asserted basis for respondent's ultimate layoff in 1983 -- a lack of funds -- was pretextual.*fn9

[107] Thus, evidence in the record amply supports the conclusion that respondent was first transferred and then laid off, not for fiscal and administrative reasons, but in retaliation for his public testimony before the CSC and HUD.*fn10 It is undisputed

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that respondent's right to testify in support of his civil service appeal and his right to testify in opposition to the City's acquisition of the Serra sculpture were protected by the First Amendment to the Federal Constitution. Given the jury's verdict, the case is therefore one in which a municipal employee's federal constitutional rights were violated by officials of the City government. There is, however, a dispute over the identity of the persons who were responsible for that violation. At trial, respondent relied on alternate theories: Either his immediate superiors at CDA (who were named as individual defendants) should be held accountable, or, if the decisions were made at a higher level of government, the City should be held responsible.

[108] The record contains a good deal of evidence of participation in the constitutional tort by respondent's superiors at CDA, by those directly under the Mayor, and perhaps by the Mayor himself.*fn11 Moreover, in closing argument, defense counsel

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