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NOTICE: This opinion is subject to formal revision before publication in the
preliminary print of the United States Reports.  Readers are requested to
notify the Reporter of Decisions, Supreme Court of the United States, Wash-
ington, D.C. 20543, of any typographical or other formal errors, in order that
corrections may be made before the preliminary print goes to press.
SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES
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No. 93-1636
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TOM SWINT, et al., PETITIONERS v. CHAMBERS
COUNTY COMMISSION et al.
on writ of certiorari to the united states court
of appeals for the eleventh circuit
[March 1, 1995]

  Justice Ginsburg delivered the opinion of the Court.
  In the wake of successive police raids on a nightclub
in Chambers County, Alabama, two of the club's owners
joined by an employee and a patron (petitioners here)
sued the Chambers County Commission (respondent
here), the City of Wadley, and three individual police
officers.  Petitioners sought damages and other relief,
pursuant to 42 U. S. C. 1983, for alleged civil rights
violations.  We granted certiorari to review the decision
of the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh
Circuit, which held that the Chambers County Commis-
sion qualified for summary judgment because the sheriff
who authorized the raids was a state executive officer
and not an agent of the County Commission.  We do not
reach that issue, however, because we conclude that the
Eleventh Circuit lacked jurisdiction to rule on the
County Commission's liability at this interlocutory stage
of the litigation.
  The Eleventh Circuit unquestionably had jurisdiction
to review the denial of the individual police officer
defendants' motions for summary judgment based on
their alleged qualified immunity from suit.  But the
Circuit Court did not thereby gain authority to review
the denial of the Chambers County Commission's motion
for summary judgment.  The Commission's appeal, we
hold, does not fit within the -collateral order- doctrine,
nor is there -pendent party- appellate authority to take
up the Commission's case.  We therefore vacate the
relevant portion of the Eleventh Circuit's judgment and
remand for proceedings consistent with this opinion.

                      I
  On December 14, 1990, and again on March 29, 1991,
law enforcement officers from Chambers County and the
City of Wadley, Alabama, raided the Capri Club in
Chambers County as part of a narcotics operation.  The
raids were conducted without a search warrant or an
arrest warrant.  Petitioners filed suit, alleging, among
other claims for relief, violations of their federal civil
rights.  Petitioners named as defendants the County
Commission; the City of Wadley; and three individual
defendants, Chambers County Sheriff James C. Morgan,
Wadley Police Chief Freddie Morgan, and Wadley Police
Officer Gregory Dendinger.
  The five defendants moved for summary judgment on
varying grounds.  The three individual defendants
asserted qualified immunity from suit on petitioners'
federal claims.  See Anderson v. Creighton, 483 U. S.
635, 639 (1987) (governmental officials are immune from
suit for civil damages unless their conduct is unreason-
able in light of clearly established law).  Without
addressing the question whether Wadley Police Chief
Freddie Morgan, who participated in the raids, was a
policymaker for the municipality, the City argued that
a respondeat superior theory could not be used to hold
it liable under 1983.  See Monell v. New York City
Dept. of Social Services, 436 U. S. 658, 694 (1978) (a
local government may not be sued under 1983 for
injury inflicted solely by its nonpolicymaking employees
or agents).  The Chambers County Commission argued
that County Sheriff James C. Morgan, who authorized
the raids, was not a policymaker for the County.
  The United States District Court for the Middle
District of Alabama denied the motions for summary
judgment.  The District Court agreed that 1983 liability
could not be imposed on the City for an injury inflicted
by a nonpolicymaking employee; that court denied the
City's summary judgment motion, however, because the
City had failed to argue that Wadley Police Chief
Freddie Morgan was not its policymaker for law enforce-
ment.  Regarding the County Commission's motion, the
District Court was -persuaded by the Plaintiffs that
Sheriff [James C.] Morgan may have been the final
decision-maker for the County in ferreting out crime,
although he is a State of Alabama employee.-  App. to
Pet. for Cert. A-67.  The District Court later denied the
defendants' motions for reconsideration, but indicated its
intent to revisit, before jury deliberations, the question
whether Sheriff Morgan was a policymaker for the
County:
     -The Chambers County Defendants correctly point
out that whether Sheriff James Morgan was the
final policy maker is a question of law that this
Court can decide.  What th[is] Court decided in its
[prior order] was that the Plaintiffs had come
forward with sufficient evidence to persuade this
Court that Sheriff Morgan may be the final policy
maker for the County.  The parties will have an
opportunity to convince this Court that Sheriff
Morgan was or was not the final policy maker for
the County, and the Court will make a ruling as a
matter of law on that issue before the case goes to
the jury.-  Id., at A-72.
  Invoking the rule that an order denying qualified
immunity is appealable before trial, Mitchell v. Forsyth,
472 U. S. 511, 530 (1985), the individual defendants
immediately appealed.  The City of Wadley and the
Chambers County Commission also appealed, arguing,
first, that the denial of their summary judgment mo-
tions-like the denial of the individual defendants'
summary judgment motions-was immediately appeal-
able as a collateral order satisfying the test announced
in Cohen v. Beneficial Industrial Loan Corp., 337 U. S.
541, 546 (1949) (decisions that are conclusive, that
resolve important questions apart from the merits of the
underlying action, and that are effectively unreviewable
on appeal from final judgment may be appealed immedi-
ately).  Alternatively, the City and County Commission
urged the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals to exercise
-pendent appellate jurisdiction,- a power that court had
asserted in earlier cases.  Stressing the Eleventh
Circuit's undisputed jurisdiction over the individual
defendants' qualified immunity pleas, the City and
County Commission maintained that, in the interest of
judicial economy, the court should resolve, simultan-
eously, the City's and Commission's appeals.
  The Eleventh Circuit affirmed in part and reversed in
part the District Court's order denying summary judg-
ment for the individual defendants.  5 F. 3d 1435, 1448
(1993), modified, 11 F. 3d 1030, 1031-1032 (1994).
Next, the Eleventh Circuit held that the District Court's
rejections of the County Commission's and City's sum-
mary judgment motions were not immediately appealable
as collateral orders.  Id., at 1449, 1452. Nevertheless,
the Circuit Court decided to exercise pendent appellate
jurisdiction over the County Commission's appeal.  Id.,
at 1449-1450.  Holding that Sheriff James C. Morgan
was not a policymaker for the County in the area of law
enforcement, the Eleventh Circuit reversed the District
Court's order denying the County Commission's motion
for summary judgment.  Id., at 1450-1451.  The Elev-
enth Circuit declined to exercise pendent appellate
jurisdiction over the City's appeal because the District
Court had not yet decided whether Wadley Police Chief
Freddie Morgan was a policymaker for the City.  Id., at
1451-1452.
  We granted certiorari to review the Court of Appeals'
decision that Sheriff Morgan is not a policymaker for
Chambers County.  512 U. S. ___ (1994).  We then
instructed the parties to file supplemental briefs ad-
dressing this question: Given the Eleventh Circuit's
jurisdiction to review immediately the District Court's
refusal to grant summary judgment for the individual
defendants in response to their pleas of qualified
immunity, did the Circuit Court also have jurisdiction to
review at once the denial of the County Commission's
summary judgment motion?  513 U. S. ___ (1994).  We
now hold that the Eleventh Circuit should have dis-
missed the County Commission's appeal for want of
jurisdiction.

                     II
  We inquire first whether the denial of the County
Commission's summary judgment motion was appealable
as a collateral order.  The answer, as the Court of
Appeals recognized, is a firm -No.-
  By statute, federal courts of appeals have -jurisdiction
of appeals from all final decisions of the district courts,-
except where direct review may be had in this Court.
28 U. S. C. 1291.  -The collateral order doctrine is best
understood not as an exception to the `final decision'
rule laid down by Congress in 1291, but as a `practical
construction' of it.-  Digital Equipment Corp. v. Desktop
Direct, Inc., 511 U. S. ___, ___ (1994) (slip op., at 3)
(quoting Cohen, 337 U. S., at 546).  In Cohen, we held
that 1291 permits appeals not only from a final
decision by which a district court disassociates itself
from a case, but also from a small category of decisions
that, although they do not end the litigation, must
nonetheless be considered -final.-  337 U. S., at 546.
That small category includes only decisions that are
conclusive, that resolve important questions separate
from the merits, and that are effectively unreviewable on
appeal from the final judgment in the underlying action.
Ibid.
  The District Court planned to reconsider its ruling on
the County Commission's summary judgment motion
before the case went to the jury.  That court had
initially determined only that -Sheriff Morgan may have
been the final policy maker for the County.-  App. to
Pet. for Cert. A-67 (emphasis added).  The ruling thus
fails the Cohen test, which -disallow[s] appeal from any
decision which is tentative, informal or incomplete.-  337
U. S., at 546; see Coopers & Lybrand v. Livesay, 437
U. S. 463, 469 (1978) (order denying class certification
held not appealable under collateral order doctrine, in
part because such an order is -subject to revision in the
District Court-).
  Moreover, the order denying the County Commission's
summary judgment motion does not satisfy Cohen's
requirement that the decision be effectively unreviewable
after final judgment.  When we placed within the
collateral order doctrine decisions denying pleas of
government officials for qualified immunity, we stressed
that an official's qualified immunity is -an immunity
from suit rather than a mere defense to liability; and
like an absolute immunity, it is effectively lost if a case
is erroneously permitted to go to trial.-  Mitchell, 472
U. S., at 526 (emphasis in original).
  The County Commission invokes our decision in
Monell, which held that municipalities are liable under
1983 only for violations of federal law that occur
pursuant to official governmental policy or custom.
Monell, the Commission contends, should be read to
accord local governments a qualified right to be free
from the burdens of trial.  Accordingly, the Commission
maintains, the Commission should be able to appeal
immediately the District Court's denial of its summary
judgment motion.  This argument undervalues a core
point we reiterated last Term: -1291 requires courts of
appeals to view claims of a `right not to be tried' with
skepticism, if not a jaundiced eye,-  Digital Equipment,
511 U. S., at ___ (slip op., at 10), for -virtually every
right that could be enforced appropriately by pretrial
dismissal might loosely be described as conferring a
`right not to stand trial.'-  Id., at ___ (slip op., at 9); cf.
United States v. MacDonald, 435 U. S. 850, 858-859
(1978) (denial of pretrial motion to dismiss an indict-
ment on speedy trial grounds held not appealable under
collateral order doctrine).
  The Commission's assertion that Sheriff Morgan is not
its policymaker does not rank, under our decisions, as
an immunity from suit.  Instead, the plea ranks as a
-mere defense to liability.-  Mitchell, 472 U. S., at 526.
An erroneous ruling on liability may be reviewed
effectively on appeal from final judgment.  Therefore, the
order denying the County Commission's summary
judgment motion was not an appealable collateral order.

                     III
  Although the Court of Appeals recognized that the
District Court's order denying the County Commission's
summary judgment motion was not appealable as a
collateral order, the Circuit Court reviewed that ruling
by assuming jurisdiction pendent to its undisputed
jurisdiction to review the denial of the individual
defendants' summary judgment motions.  Describing this
-pendent appellate jurisdiction- as discretionary, the
Eleventh Circuit concluded that judicial economy
warranted its exercise in the instant case: -If the County
Commission is correct about the merits in its appeal,-
the court explained, -reviewing the district court's order
would put an end to the entire case against the County
. . . .-  5 F. 3d, at 1450.
  Petitioners join respondent Chambers County Commis-
sion in urging that the Eleventh Circuit had pendent
appellate jurisdiction to review the District Court's order
denying the Commission's summary judgment motion.
Both sides emphasize that 1291's final decision require-
ment is designed to prevent parties from interrupting
litigation by pursuing piecemeal appeals.  Once litigation
has already been interrupted by an authorized pretrial
appeal, petitioners and the County Commission reason,
there is no cause to resist the economy that pendent
appellate jurisdiction promotes.  See Supplemental Brief
for Petitioners 16-17; Supplemental Brief for Respondent
5, 9.  Respondent County Commission invites us to
adopt a -`libera[l]'- construction of 1291, and petitioners
urge an interpretation sufficiently -[p]ractical- and
-[f]lexible- to accommodate pendent appellate review as
exercised by the Eleventh Circuit.  See Supplemental
Brief for Respondent 4; Supplemental Brief for Petition-
ers 14.
  These arguments drift away from the statutory
instructions Congress has given to control the timing of
appellate proceedings.  The main rule on review of -final
decisions,- 28 U. S. C. 1291, is followed by prescriptions
for appeals from -interlocutory decisions,- 28 U. S. C.
1292.  Section 1292(a) lists three categories of immedi-
ately appealable interlocutory decisions.  Of prime
significance to the jurisdictional issue before us, Con-
gress, in 1958, augmented the 1292 catalogue of
immediately appealable orders; Congress added a
provision, 1292(b), according the district courts circum-
scribed authority to certify for immediate appeal inter-
locutory orders deemed pivotal and debatable.  Section
1292(b) provides:
     -When a district judge, in making in a civil action
an order not otherwise appealable under this sec-
tion, shall be of the opinion that such order involves
a controlling question of law as to which there is
substantial ground for difference of opinion and that
an immediate appeal from the order may materially
advance the ultimate termination of the litigation,
he shall so state in writing in such order.  The
Court of Appeals which would have jurisdiction of
an appeal of such action may thereupon, in its
discretion, permit an appeal to be taken from such
order, if application is made to it within ten days
after the entry of the order: Provided, however, That
application for an appeal hereunder shall not stay
proceedings in the district court unless the district
judge or the Court of Appeals or a judge thereof
shall so order.-
Congress thus chose to confer on district courts first line
discretion to allow interlocutory appeals.  If courts of
appeals had discretion to append to a Cohen-authorized
appeal from a collateral order further rulings of a kind
neither independently appealable nor certified by the
district court, then the two-tiered arrangement 1292(b)
mandates would be severely undermined.

  Two relatively recent additions to the Judicial Code
also counsel resistance to expansion of appellate jurisdic-
tion in the manner endorsed by the Eleventh Circuit.
The Rules Enabling Act, 28 U. S. C. 2071 et seq., gives
this Court -the power to prescribe general rules of
practice and procedure . . . for cases in the United
States district courts . . . and courts of appeals.-
2072(a).  In 1990, Congress added 2072(c), which
authorizes us to prescribe rules -defin[ing] when a ruling
of a district court is final for the purposes of appeal
under section 1291.-  Two years later, Congress added
1292(e), which allows us to -prescribe rules, in accord-
ance with section 2072 . . . to provide for an appeal of
an interlocutory decision to the courts of appeals that is
not otherwise provided for under [1292] subsection (a),
(b), (c), or (d).-
  Congress thus has empowered this Court to clarify
when a decision qualifies as -final- for appellate review
purposes, and to expand the list of orders appealable on
an interlocutory basis.  The procedure Congress ordered
for such changes, however, is not expansion by court
decision, but by rulemaking under 2072.  Our
rulemaking authority is constrained by 2073 and 2074,
which require, among other things, that meetings of
bench-bar committees established to recommend rules
ordinarily be open to the public, 2073(c)(1), and that
any proposed rule be submitted to Congress before the
rule takes effect.  2074(a).  Congress' designation of the
rulemaking process as the way to define or refine when
a district court ruling is -final- and when an interlocu-
tory order is appealable warrants the Judiciary's full
respect.
  Two decisions of this Court securely support the
conclusion that the Eleventh Circuit lacked jurisdiction
instantly to review the denial of the County Commis-
sion's summary judgment motion: Abney v. United
States, 431 U. S. 651 (1977), and United States v.
Stanley, 483 U. S. 669 (1987).  In Abney, we permitted
appeal before trial of an order denying a motion to
dismiss an indictment on double jeopardy grounds.
Immediate appeal of that ruling, we held, fit within the
Cohen collateral order doctrine.  431 U. S., at 662.  But
we further held that the Court of Appeals lacked
authority to review simultaneously the trial court's
rejection of the defendant's challenge to the sufficiency
of the indictment.  Id., at 662-663.  We explained:
-Our conclusion that a defendant may seek immedi-
ate appellate review of a district court's rejection of
his double jeopardy claim is based on the special
considerations permeating claims of that nature
which justify a departure from the normal rule of
finality.  Quite obviously, such considerations do not
extend beyond the claim of formal jeopardy and
encompass other claims presented to, and rejected
by, the district court in passing on the accused's
motion to dismiss.  Rather, such claims are appeal-
able if, and only if, they too fall within Cohen's
collateral-order exception to the final-judgment rule.
Any other rule would encourage criminal defendants
to seek review of, or assert, frivolous double jeop-
ardy claims in order to bring more serious, but
otherwise nonappealable questions to the attention
of the courts of appeals prior to conviction and
sentence.-  Id., at 663 (citation omitted).
Petitioners suggest that Abney should control in criminal
cases only.  Supplemental Brief for Petitioners 11.  But
the concern expressed in Abney-that a rule loosely
allowing pendent appellate jurisdiction would encourage
parties to parlay Cohen-type collateral orders into multi-
issue interlocutory appeal tickets-bears on civil cases as
well.
  In Stanley, we similarly refused to allow expansion of
the scope of an interlocutory appeal.  That civil case
involved an order certified by the trial court, and
accepted by the appellate court, for immediate review
pursuant to 1292(b).  Immediate appellate review, we
held, was limited to the certified order; issues presented
by other, noncertified orders could not be considered
simultaneously.  483 U. S., at 676-677.
  The parties are correct that we have not universally
required courts of appeals to confine review to the
precise decision independently subject to appeal.  See,
e.g., Thornburgh v. American College of Obstetricians
and Gynecologists, 476 U. S. 747, 755-757 (1986) (court
of appeals reviewing district court's ruling on prelimi-
nary injunction request properly reviewed merits as
well); Eisen v. Carlisle & Jacquelin, 417 U. S. 156,
172-173 (1974) (court of appeals reviewing district
court's order allocating costs of class notification also
had jurisdiction to review ruling on methods of notifica-
tion); Chicago, R. I. & P. R. Co. v. Stude, 346 U. S. 574,
578 (1954) (court of appeals reviewing order granting
motion to dismiss properly reviewed order denying
opposing party's motion to remand); Deckert v. Indepen-
dence Shares Corp., 311 U. S. 282, 287 (1940) (court of
appeals reviewing order granting preliminary injunction
also had jurisdiction to review order denying motions to
dismiss).  Cf. Schlagenhauf v. Holder, 379 U. S. 104,
110-111 (1964) (court of appeals exercising mandamus
power should have reviewed not only whether district
court had authority to order mental and physical
examinations of defendant in personal injury case, but
also whether there was good cause for the ordered
examinations).
  We need not definitively or preemptively settle here
whether or when it may be proper for a court of appeals
with jurisdiction over one ruling to review, conjunctively,
related rulings that are not themselves independently
appealable.  See supra, at 12-13 (describing provisions
by Congress for rulemaking regarding appeals prior to
the district court's final disposition of entire case).  The
parties do not contend that the District Court's decision
to deny the Chambers County Commission's summary
judgment motion was inextricably intertwined with that
court's decision to deny the individual defendants'
qualified immunity motions, or that review of the former
decision was necessary to ensure meaningful review of
the latter.  Cf. Kanji, The Proper Scope of Pendent
Appellate Jurisdiction in the Collateral Order Context,
100 Yale L. J. 511, 530 (1990) (-Only where essential to
the resolution of properly appealed collateral orders
should courts extend their Cohen jurisdiction to rulings
that would not otherwise qualify for expedited consider-
ation.-).  Nor could the parties so argue.  The individual
defendants' qualified immunity turns on whether they
violated clearly established federal law; the County
Commission's liability turns on the allocation of law
enforcement power in Alabama.


                *     *     *
  The Eleventh Circuit's authority immediately to review
the District Court's denial of the individual police officer
defendants' summary judgment motions did not include
authority to review at once the unrelated question of the
County Commission's liability.  The District Court's
preliminary ruling regarding the County did not qualify
as a -collateral order,- and there is no -pendent party-
appellate jurisdiction of the kind the Eleventh Circuit
purported to exercise.  We therefore vacate the relevant
portion of the Eleventh Circuit's judgment, and remand
for proceedings consistent with this opinion.

                            It is so ordered.