510 U.S. 266 (1994)

ALBRIGHT
v.
OLIVER et al.

No. 92-833.

Supreme Court of United States.

Argued October 12, 1993. Decided January 24, 1994. CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE SEVENTH CIRCUIT.

*267 REHNQUIST, C. J., announced the judgment of the Court and delivered an opinion, in which O'CONNOR, SCALIA, and GINSBURG, JJ., joined. SCALIA, J., post, p. 275, and GINSBURG, J., post, p. 276, filed concurring opinions. KENNEDY, J., filed an opinion concurring in the judgment, in which THOMAS, J., joined, post, p. 281. SOUTER, J., filed an opinion concurring in the judgment, post, p. 286. STEVENS, J., filed a dissenting opinion, in which BLACKMUN, J., joined, post, p. 291.

John H. Bisbee argued the cause for petitioner. With him on the briefs was Barry Nakell.

*268 James G. Sotos argued the cause for respondents. With him on the brief were Michael W. Condon, Charles E. Hervas, and Michael D. Bersani.^[*]

CHIEF JUSTICE REHNQUIST announced the judgment of the Court and delivered an opinion, in which JUSTICE O'CONNOR, JUSTICE SCALIA, and JUSTICE GINSBURG join.

A warrant was issued for petitioner's arrest by Illinois authorities, and upon learning of it he surrendered and was released on bail. The prosecution was later dismissed on the ground that the charge did not state an offense under Illinois law. Petitioner asks us to recognize a substantive right under the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to be free from criminal prosecution except upon probable cause. We decline to do so.

We review a decision of the Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit affirming the grant of a motion to dismiss the complaint pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6), and we must therefore accept the well-pleaded allegations of the complaint as true. Illinois authorities issued an arrest warrant for petitioner Kevin Albright, charging him on the basis of a previously filed criminal information with the sale of a substance which looked like an illegal drug. When he learned of the outstanding warrant, petitioner surrendered to respondent, Roger Oliver, a police detective employed by the city of Macomb, but denied his guilt of such an offense. He was released after posting bond, one of the conditions of which was that he not leave the State without permission of the court.^[1]

*269 At a preliminary hearing, respondent Oliver testified that petitioner sold the look-alike substance to Moore, and the court found probable cause to bind petitioner over for trial. At a later pretrial hearing, the court dismissed the criminal action against petitioner on the ground that the charge did not state an offense under Illinois law.

Albright then instituted this action under Rev. Stat. § 1979, 42 U. S. C. § 1983, against Detective Oliver in his individual and official capacities, alleging that Oliver deprived him of substantive due process under the Fourteenth Amendment—his "liberty interest"—to be free from criminal prosecution except upon probable cause.^[2] The District Court granted respondent's motion to dismiss under Rule 12(b)(6) on the ground that the complaint did not state a claim under § 1983.^[3] The Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit affirmed, 975 F. 2d 343 (1992), relying on our decision in Paul v. Davis, 424 U. S. 693 (1976). The Court of Appeals held that prosecution without probable cause is a constitutional tort actionable under § 1983 only if accompanied by incarceration or loss of employment or some other "palpable *270 consequenc[e]." 975 F. 2d, at 346-347. The panel of the Seventh Circuit reasoned that "just as in the garden-variety public-officer defamation case that does not result in exclusion from an occupation, state tort remedies should be adequate and the heavy weaponry of constitutional litigation can be left at rest." Id., at 347.^[4] We granted certiorari, 507 *271 U. S. 959 (1993), and while we affirm the judgment below, we do so on different grounds. We hold that it is the Fourth Amendment, and not substantive due process, under which petitioner Albright's claim must be judged.

Section 1983 "is not itself a source of substantive rights," but merely provides "a method for vindicating federal rights elsewhere conferred." Baker v. McCollan, 443 U. S. 137, 144, n. 3 (1979). The first step in any such claim is to identify the specific constitutional right allegedly infringed. Graham v. Connor, 490 U. S. 386, 394 (1989); and Baker v. McCollan, supra, at 140.

Petitioner's claim before this Court is a very limited one. He claims that the action of respondents infringed his substantive due process right to be free of prosecution without probable cause. He does not claim that Illinois denied him the procedural due process guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment. Nor does he claim a violation of his Fourth Amendment rights, notwithstanding the fact that his surrender to the State's show of authority constituted a seizure for purposes of the Fourth Amendment. Terry v. Ohio, 392 U. S. 1, 19 (1968); Brower v. County of Inyo, 489 U. S. 593, 596 (1989).^[5]

We begin analysis of petitioner's claim by repeating our observation in Collins v. Harker Heights, 503 U. S. 115, 125 (1992). "As a general matter, the Court has always been reluctant to expand the concept of substantive due process *272 because the guideposts for responsible decisionmaking in this unchartered area are scarce and open-ended." The protections of substantive due process have for the most part been accorded to matters relating to marriage, family, procreation, and the right to bodily integrity. See, e. g., Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Pa. v. Casey, 505 U. S. 833, 847-849 (1992) (describing cases in which substantive due process rights have been recognized). Petitioner's claim to be free from prosecution except on the basis of probable cause is markedly different from those recognized in this group of cases.

Petitioner relies on our observations in cases such as United States v. Salerno, 481 U. S. 739, 746 (1987), and Daniels v. Williams, 474 U. S. 327, 331 (1986), that the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment confers both substantive and procedural rights. This is undoubtedly true, but it sheds little light on the scope of substantive due process. Petitioner points in particular to language from Hurtado v. California, 110 U. S. 516, 527 (1884), later quoted in Daniels, supra, stating that the words "by the law of the land" from the Magna Carta were "`intended to secure the individual from the arbitrary exercise of the powers of government.'" This, too, may be freely conceded, but it does not follow that, in all of the various aspects of a criminal prosecution, the only inquiry mandated by the Constitution is whether, in the view of the Court, the governmental action in question was "arbitrary."

Hurtado held that the Due Process Clause did not make applicable to the States the Fifth Amendment's requirement that all prosecutions for an infamous crime be instituted by the indictment of a grand jury. In the more than 100 years which have elapsed since Hurtado was decided, the Court has concluded that a number of the procedural protections contained in the Bill of Rights were made applicable to the States by the Fourteenth Amendment. See Mapp v. Ohio, 367 U. S. 643 (1961), overruling Wolf v. Colorado, 338 U. S. *273 25 (1949), and holding the Fourth Amendment's exclusionary rule applicable to the States; Malloy v. Hogan, 378 U. S. 1 (1964), overruling Twining v. New Jersey, 211 U. S. 78 (1908), and holding the Fifth Amendment's privilege against self-incrimination applicable to the States; Benton v. Maryland, 395 U. S. 784 (1969), overruling Palko v. Connecticut, 302 U. S. 319 (1937), and holding the Double Jeopardy Clause of the Fifth Amendment applicable to the States; Gideon v. Wainwright, 372 U. S. 335 (1963), overruling Betts v. Brady, 316 U. S. 455 (1942), and holding that the Sixth Amendment's right to counsel was applicable to the States. See also Klopfer v. North Carolina, 386 U. S. 213 (1967) (Sixth Amendment speedy trial right applicable to the States); Washington v. Texas, 388 U. S. 14 (1967) (Sixth Amendment right to compulsory process applicable to the States); Duncan v. Louisiana, 391 U. S. 145 (1968) (Sixth Amendment right to jury trial applicable to the States).

This course of decision has substituted, in these areas of criminal procedure, the specific guarantees of the various provisions of the Bill of Rights embodied in the first 10 Amendments to the Constitution for the more generalized language contained in the earlier cases construing the Fourteenth Amendment. It was through these provisions of the Bill of Rights that their Framers sought to restrict the exercise of arbitrary authority by the Government in particular situations. Where a particular Amendment "provides an explicit textual source of constitutional protection" against a particular sort of government behavior, "that Amendment, not the more generalized notion of `substantive due process,' must be the guide for analyzing these claims." Graham v. Connor, supra, at 395.^[6]

*274 We think this principle is likewise applicable here. The Framers considered the matter of pretrial deprivations of liberty and drafted the Fourth Amendment to address it. The Fourth Amendment provides:

"The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized."

We have in the past noted the Fourth Amendment's relevance to the deprivations of liberty that go hand in hand with criminal prosecutions. See Gerstein v. Pugh, 420 U. S. 103, 114 (1975) (holding that the Fourth Amendment requires a judicial determination of probable cause as a prerequisite to any extended restraint on liberty following an arrest). We have said that the accused is not "entitled to judicial oversight or review of the decision to prosecute." Id., at 118-119. See also Beck v. Washington, 369 U. S. 541, 545 (1962); Lem Woon v. Oregon, 229 U. S. 586 (1913). But here petitioner was not merely charged; he submitted himself to arrest.

*275 We express no view as to whether petitioner's claim would succeed under the Fourth Amendment, since he has not presented that question in his petition for certiorari. We do hold that substantive due process, with its "scarce and open-ended" "guideposts," Collins v. Harker Heights, 503 U. S., at 125, can afford him no relief.^[7]

The judgment of the Court of Appeals is therefore

Affirmed.

JUSTICE SCALIA, concurring.

One can conceive of many abuses of the trial process (for example, the use of a patently biased judge, see Mayberry v. Pennsylvania, 400 U. S. 455, 465-466 (1971)) that might cause a criminal sentence to be a deprivation of life, liberty or property without due process. But here there was no criminal sentence (the indictment was dismissed), and so the only deprivation of life, liberty or property, if any, consisted of petitioner's pretrial arrest. I think it unlikely that the procedures constitutionally "due," with regard to an arrest, consist of anything more than what the Fourth Amendment specifies; but petitioner has in any case not invoked "procedural" due process.

Except insofar as our decisions have included within the Fourteenth Amendment certain explicit substantive protections of the Bill of Rights—an extension I accept because it is both long established and narrowly limited—I reject the proposition that the Due Process Clause guarantees certain (unspecified) liberties, rather than merely guarantees certain procedures as a prerequisite to deprivation of liberty. See TXO Production Corp. v. Alliance Resources Corp., 509 U. S. *276 443, 470-471 (1993) (SCALIA, J., concurring). As I have acknowledged, however, see Michael H. v. Gerald D., 491 U. S. 110, 121 (1989) (opinion of SCALIA, J.), this Court's current jurisprudence is otherwise. But that jurisprudence rejects "the more generalized notion of `substantive due process'" at least to this extent: It cannot be used to impose additional requirements upon such of the States' criminal processes as are already addressed (and left without such requirements) by the Bill of Rights. Graham v. Connor, 490 U. S. 386, 395 (1989). That proscription applies here. The Bill of Rights sets forth, in the Fifth and Sixth Amendments, procedural guarantees relating to the period before and during trial, including a guarantee (the Grand Jury Clause) regarding the manner of indictment. Those requirements are not to be supplemented through the device of "substantive due process."

For these reasons, in addition to those set forth by THE CHIEF JUSTICE, the judgment here should be affirmed.

JUSTICE GINSBURG, concurring.

I agree with the plurality that Albright's claim against the police officer responsible for his arrest is properly analyzed under the Fourth Amendment rather than under the heading of substantive due process. See ante, at 271. I therefore join the plurality opinion and write separately to indicate more particularly my reasons for viewing this case through a Fourth Amendment lens.

Albright's factual allegations convey that Detective Oliver notoriously disobeyed the injunction against unreasonable seizures imposed on police officers by the Fourth Amendment, and Albright appropriately invoked that Amendment as a basis for his claim. See App. to Pet. for Cert. A-37, A-53. Albright's submission to arrest unquestionably constituted a seizure for purposes of the Fourth Amendment. See ante, at 271. And, as the Court of Appeals recognized, if the facts were as Albright alleged, then Oliver lacked cause *277 to suspect, let alone apprehend him. 975 F. 2d 343, 345 (CA7 1992); see post, at 292-293 (STEVENS, J., dissenting).

Yet in his presentations before this Court, Albright deliberately subordinated invocation of the Fourth Amendment and pressed, instead, a substantive due process right to be free from prosecution without probable cause.^[1] This strategic decision appears to have been predicated on two doubtful assumptions, the first relating to the compass of the Fourth Amendment, the second, to the time frame for commencing this civil action.

Albright may have feared that courts would narrowly define the Fourth Amendment's key term "seizure" so as to deny full scope to his claim. In particular, he might have anticipated a holding that the "seizure" of his person ended when he was released from custody on bond, and a corresponding conclusion that Oliver's allegedly misleading testimony at the preliminary hearing escaped Fourth Amendment interdiction.^[2]

The Fourth Amendment's instruction to police officers seems to me more purposive and embracing. This Court has noted that the common law may aid contemporary inquiry into the meaning of the Amendment's term "seizure." See California v. Hodari D., 499 U. S. 621, 626, n. 2 (1991). At common law, an arrested person's seizure was deemed to *278 continue even after release from official custody. See, e. g., 2 M. Hale, Pleas of the Crown *124 ("he that is bailed, is in supposition of law still in custody, and the parties that take him to bail are in law his keepers"); 4 W. Blackstone, Commentaries *297 (bail in both civil and criminal cases is "a delivery or bailment, of a person to his sureties, . . . he being supposed to continue in their friendly custody, instead of going to gaol"). The purpose of an arrest at common law, in both criminal and civil cases, was "only to compel an appearance in court," and "that purpose is equally answered, whether the sheriff detains [the suspect's] person, or takes sufficient security for his appearance, called bail." 3 id., at *290 (civil cases); 4 id., at *297 (nature of bail is the same in criminal and civil cases). The common law thus seems to have regarded the difference between pretrial incarceration and other ways to secure a defendant's court attendance as a distinction between methods of retaining control over a defendant's person, not one between seizure and its opposite.^[3]

This view of the definition and duration of a seizure comports with common sense and common understanding. A person facing serious criminal charges is hardly freed from the state's control upon his release from a police officer's physical grip. He is required to appear in court at the state's command. He is often subject, as in this case, to the condition that he seek formal permission from the court (at significant expense) before exercising what would otherwise be his unquestioned right to travel outside the jurisdiction. Pending prosecution, his employment prospects may be diminished severely, he may suffer reputational harm, and he will experience the financial and emotional strain of preparing a defense.

*279 A defendant incarcerated until trial no doubt suffers greater burdens. That difference, however, should not lead to the conclusion that a defendant released pretrial is not still "seized" in the constitutionally relevant sense. Such a defendant is scarcely at liberty; he remains apprehended, arrested in his movements, indeed "seized" for trial, so long as he is bound to appear in court and answer the state's charges. He is equally bound to appear, and is hence "seized" for trial, when the state employs the less strong-arm means of a summons in lieu of arrest to secure his presence in court.^[4]

This conception of a seizure and its course recognizes that the vitality of the Fourth Amendment depends upon its constant observance by police officers. For Oliver, the Fourth Amendment governed both the manner of, and the cause for, arresting Albright. If Oliver gave misleading testimony at the preliminary hearing, that testimony served to maintain and reinforce the unlawful haling of Albright into court, and so perpetuated the Fourth Amendment violation.^[5]

*280 A second reason for Albright's decision not to pursue a Fourth Amendment claim concerns the statute of limitations. The Court of Appeals suggested in dictum that any Fourth Amendment claim Albright might have had accrued on the date of his arrest, and that the applicable 2-year limitations period expired before the complaint was filed.^[6] 975 F. 2d, at 345. Albright expressed his acquiescence in this view at oral argument. Tr. of Oral Arg. 13, 20-21.

Once it is recognized, however, that Albright remained effectively "seized" for trial so long as the prosecution against him remained pending, and that Oliver's testimony at the preliminary hearing, if deliberately misleading, violated the Fourth Amendment by perpetuating the seizure, then the limitations period should have a different trigger. The time to file the § 1983 action should begin to run not at the start, but at the end of the episode in suit, i. e., upon dismissal of the criminal charges against Albright. See McCune v. Grand Rapids, 842 F. 2d 903, 908 (CA6 1988) (Guy, J., concurring in result) ("Where . . . innocence is what makes the state action wrongful, it makes little sense to require a federal suit to be filed until innocence or its equivalent is established by the termination of the state procedures in a manner favorable to the state criminal defendant."). In sum, Albright's Fourth Amendment claim, asserted within the requisite period after dismissal of the criminal action, in my judgment was neither substantively deficient nor inevitably time barred. It was, however, a claim Albright abandoned in the District Court and did not attempt to reassert in this Court. *281 The principle of party presentation cautions decisionmakers against asserting it for him. See ante, at 275.

* * *

In Graham v. Connor, 490 U. S. 386 (1989), this Court refused to analyze under a "substantive due process" heading an individual's right to be free from police applications of excessive force. "Because the Fourth Amendment provides an explicit textual source of constitutional protection against this sort of... governmental conduct," we said, "that Amendment, not the more generalized notion of `substantive due process,' must be the guide for analyzing these claims." Id., at 395. I conclude that the Fourth Amendment similarly proscribes the police misconduct Albright alleges. I therefore resist in this case the plea "to break new ground," see Collins v. Harker Heights, 503 U. S. 115, 125 (1992), in a field—substantive due process—that "has at times been a treacherous [one] for this Court." See Moore v. East Cleveland, 431 U. S. 494, 502 (1977) (opinion of Powell, J.).

JUSTICE KENNEDY, with whom JUSTICE THOMAS joins, concurring in the judgment.

I agree with the plurality that an allegation of arrest without probable cause must be analyzed under the Fourth Amendment without reference to more general considerations of due process. But I write because Albright's due process claim concerns not his arrest but instead the malicious initiation of a baseless criminal prosecution against him.

I

The State must, of course, comply with the constitutional requirements of due process before it convicts and sentences a person who has violated state law. The initial question here is whether the due process requirements for criminal proceedings include a standard for the initiation of a prosecution.

*282 The specific provisions of the Bill of Rights neither impose a standard for the initiation of a prosecution, see U. S. Const., Amdts. 5, 6, nor require a pretrial hearing to weigh evidence according to a given standard, see Gerstein v. Pugh, 420 U. S. 103, 119 (1975) ("[A] judicial hearing is not prerequisite to prosecution"); Costello v. United States, 350 U. S. 359, 363 (1956) ("An indictment returned by a legally constituted and unbiased grand jury, like an information drawn by the prosecutor, . . . is enough to call for trial of the charge on the merits. The Fifth Amendment requires nothing more") (footnote omitted). Instead, the Bill of Rights requires a grand jury indictment and a speedy trial where a petit jury can determine whether the charges are true. Amdts. 5, 6.

To be sure, we have held that a criminal rule or procedure that does not contravene one of the more specific guarantees of the Bill of Rights may nonetheless violate the Due Process Clause if it "`offends some principle of justice so rooted in the traditions and conscience of our people as to be ranked as fundamental.'" Medina v. California, 505 U. S. 437, 445 (1992) (quoting Patterson v. New York, 432 U. S. 197, 202 (1977)). With respect to the initiation of charges, however, the specific guarantees contained in the Bill of Rights mirror the traditional requirements of the criminal process. The common law provided for a grand jury indictment and a speedy trial; it did not provide a specific evidentiary standard applicable to a pretrial hearing on the merits of the charges or subject to later review by the courts. See United States v. Williams, 504 U. S. 36, 51 (1992); Costello, supra, at 362-363; United States v. Reed, 27 F. Cas. 727, 738 (No. 16,134) (CC NDNY 1852) (Nelson, J.) ("No case has been cited, nor have we been able to find any, furnishing an authority for looking into and revising the judgment of the grand jury upon the evidence, for the purpose of determining whether or not the finding was founded upon sufficient proof").

Moreover, because the Constitution requires a speedy trial but no pretrial hearing on the sufficiency of the charges *283 (leaving aside the question of extended pretrial detention, see County of Riverside v. McLaughlin, 500 U. S. 44 (1991)), any standard governing the initiation of charges would be superfluous in providing protection during the criminal process. If the charges are not proved beyond a reasonable doubt at trial, the charges are dismissed; if the charges are proved beyond a reasonable doubt at trial, any standard applicable to the initiation of charges is irrelevant because it is perforce met. This case thus differs in kind from In re Winship, 397 U. S. 358 (1970), and the other criminal cases where we have recognized due process requirements not specified in the Bill of Rights. The constitutional requirements we enforced in those cases ensured fundamental fairness in the determination of guilt at trial. See, e. g., Mooney v. Holohan, 294 U. S. 103, 112 (1935) (due process prohibits "deliberate deception of court and jury" by prosecution's knowing use of perjured testimony); ante, at 273-274, n. 6.

In sum, the due process requirements for criminal proceedings do not include a standard for the initiation of a criminal prosecution.

II

That may not be the end of the due process inquiry, however. The common law of torts long recognized that a malicious prosecution, like a defamatory statement, can cause unjustified torment and anguish—both by tarnishing one's name and by costing the accused money in legal fees and the like. See generally W. Keeton, D. Dobbs, R. Keeton, & D. Owen, Prosser and Keeton on Law of Torts § 119, pp. 870-889 (5th ed. 1984); T. Cooley, Law of Torts 180-187 (1879). We have held, of course, that the Due Process Clause protects interests other than the interest in freedom from physical restraint, see Michael H. v. Gerald D., 491 U. S. 110, 121 (1989), and for purposes of this case, we can assume, arguendo, that some of the interests granted historical protection by the common law of torts (such as the interests in freedom from defamation and malicious prosecution) *284 are protected by the Due Process Clause. Even so, our precedents make clear that a state actor's random and unauthorized deprivation of that interest cannot be challenged under 42 U. S. C. § 1983 so long as the State provides an adequate postdeprivation remedy. Parratt v. Taylor, 451 U. S. 527, 535-544 (1981); see Hudson v. Palmer, 468 U. S. 517, 531-536 (1984); Ingraham v. Wright, 430 U. S. 651, 674-682 (1977); id., at 701 (STEVENS, J., dissenting) ("adequate state remedy for defamation may satisfy the due process requirement when a State has impaired an individual's interest in his reputation").

The commonsense teaching of Parratt is that some questions of property, contract, and tort law are best resolved by state legal systems without resort to the federal courts, even when a state actor is the alleged wrongdoer. As we explained in Parratt, the contrary approach "would almost necessarily result in turning every alleged injury which may have been inflicted by a state official acting under `color of law' into a violation of the Fourteenth Amendment cognizable under § 1983. . . . Presumably, under this rationale any party who is involved in nothing more than an automobile accident with a state official could allege a constitutional violation under § 1983. Such reasoning `would make of the Fourteenth Amendment a font of tort law to be superimposed upon whatever systems may already be administered by the States.'" 451 U. S., at 544 (quoting Paul v. Davis, 424 U. S. 693, 701 (1976)). The Parratt principle respects the delicate balance between state and federal courts and comports with the design of § 1983, a statute that reinforces a legal tradition in which protection for persons and their rights is afforded by the common law and the laws of the States, as well as by the Constitution. See Parratt, supra, at 531-532.

Yet it is fair to say that courts, including our own, have been cautious in invoking the rule of Parratt. See Mann v. Tucson, 782 F. 2d 790, 798 (CA9 1986) (Sneed, J., concurring). *285 That hesitancy is in part a recognition of the important role federal courts have assumed in elaborating vital constitutional guarantees against arbitrary or oppressive state action. We want to leave an avenue open for recourse where we think the federal power ought to be vindicated. Cf. Screws v. United States, 325 U. S. 91 (1945).

But the price of our ambivalence over the outer limits of Parratt has been its dilution and, in some respects, its transformation into a mere pleading exercise. The Parratt rule has been avoided by attaching a substantive rather than procedural label to due process claims (a distinction that if accepted in this context could render Parratt a dead letter) and by treating claims based on the Due Process Clause as claims based on some other constitutional provision. See Taylor v. Knapp, 871 F. 2d 803, 807 (CA9 1989) (Sneed, J., concurring). It has been avoided at the other end of the spectrum by construing complaints alleging a substantive injury as attacks on the adequacy of state procedures. See Zinermon v. Burch, 494 U. S. 113, 139-151 (1990) (O'CONNOR, J., dissenting); Easter House v. Felder, 910 F. 2d 1387, 1408 (CA7 1990) (Easterbrook, J., concurring). These evasions are unjustified given the clarity of the Parratt rule: In the ordinary case where an injury has been caused not by a state law, policy, or procedure, but by a random and unauthorized act that can be remedied by state law, there is no basis for intervention under § 1983, at least in a suit based on "the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment simpliciter." 451 U. S., at 536.

As Parratt's precedential force must be acknowledged, I think it disposes of this case. Illinois provides a tort remedy for malicious prosecution; indeed, Albright brought a state-law malicious prosecution claim, albeit after the statute of limitations had expired. (That fact does not affect the adequacy of the remedy under Parratt. See Daniels v. Williams, 474 U. S. 327, 342 (1986) (STEVENS, J., concurring).) Given the state remedy and the holding of Parratt, there is *286 neither need nor legitimacy to invoke § 1983 in this case. See 975 F. 2d 343, 347 (CA7 1992) (case below).

III

That said, if a State did not provide a tort remedy for malicious prosecution, there would be force to the argument that the malicious initiation of a baseless criminal prosecution infringes an interest protected by the Due Process Clause and enforceable under § 1983. Compare Ingraham v. Wright, 430 U. S., at 676, id., at 701-702 (STEVENS, J., dissenting), and Board of Regents of State Colleges v. Roth, 408 U. S. 564, 573 (1972), with Paul v. Davis, supra, at 711-712; see PruneYard Shopping Center v. Robins, 447 U. S. 74, 93-94 (1980) (Marshall, J., concurring); Martinez v. California, 444 U. S. 277, 281-282 (1980); Munn v. Illinois, 94 U. S. 113, 134 (1877). But given the state tort remedy, we need not conduct that inquiry in this case.

* * *

For these reasons, I concur in the judgment of the Court holding that the dismissal of petitioner Albright's complaint was proper.

JUSTICE SOUTER, concurring in the judgment.

While I agree with the Court's judgment that petitioner has not justified recognition of a substantive due process violation in his prosecution without probable cause, I reach that result by a route different from that of the plurality. The Court has previously rejected the proposition that the Constitution's application to a general subject (like prosecution) is necessarily exhausted by protection under particular textual guarantees addressing specific events within that subject (like search and seizure), on a theory that one specific constitutional provision can pre-empt a broad field as against another more general one. See United States v. James Daniel Good Real Property, ante, at 49 ("We have rejected the *287 view that the applicability of one constitutional amendment pre-empts the guarantees of another"); Soldal v. Cook County, 506 U. S. 56, 70 (1992) ("Certain wrongs affect more than a single right and, accordingly, can implicate more than one of the Constitution's commands. Where such multiple violations are alleged, we are not in the habit of identifying as a preliminary matter the claim's `dominant' character. Rather, we examine each constitutional provision in turn"). It has likewise rejected the view that incorporation of the substantive guarantees of the first eight Amendments to the Constitution defines the limits of due process protection, see Adamson v. California, 332 U. S. 46, 89-92 (1947) (Black, J., dissenting). The second Justice Harlan put it this way:

"[T]he full scope of the liberty guaranteed by the Due Process Clause . . . is not a series of isolated points . . . . It is a rational continuum which, broadly speaking, includes a freedom from all substantial arbitrary impositions and purposeless restraints . . . ." Poe v. Ullman, 367 U. S. 497, 543 (1961) (dissenting opinion).

We are, nonetheless, required by "[t]he doctrine of judicial self-restraint. . . to exercise the utmost care whenever we are asked to break new ground in [the] field" of substantive due process. Collins v. Harker Heights, 503 U. S. 115, 125 (1992). Just as the concept of due process does not protect against insubstantial impositions on liberty, neither should the "rational continuum" be reduced to the mere duplication of protections adequate