Chapter 21-8 Sovereign Immunity

• Jurisdiction: United States

21-8 Sovereign Immunity

In the past, the Texas Supreme Court has stated that Texas courts have no subject matter jurisdiction over claims against a sovereign unless the sovereign has consented to the lawsuit, such as by means of the Texas Tort Claims Act.⁶⁰ The Tort Claims Act waives sovereignty in only three areas: (1) use of publicly owned automobiles; (2) premises defects: and (3) injuries arising out of conditions or use of property.⁶¹

The Texas Supreme Court has subsequently clarified this previous statement:

"It is true we have stated that sovereign immunity is a jurisdictional bar. For example, we stated in a frequently cited decision, Texas Department of Parks and Wildlife v. Miranda, 'In Texas, sovereign immunity deprives a trial court of subject matter jurisdiction for lawsuits in which the state or certain governmental units have been sued unless the state consents to suit'. But more recently, we have been more guarded in our description of the interplay of jurisdiction and sovereign immunity in three decisions: Houston Belt & Terminal Railway Co. v. City of Houston; Manbeck v. Austin Independent School District; and Rusk State Hospital v. Black. We stated in these cases, quite deliberately, that sovereign immunity 'implicates' the trial court's subject matter jurisdiction. We did not hold that sovereign immunity equates to a lack of subject matter jurisdiction for all purposes or that sovereign immunity so implicates subject matter jurisdiction that it allows collateral attack on a final judgment."⁶²

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