Butz v. Economou

The second principle the Supreme Court established in the Butz decision was that federal officials would only be held liable for overt constitutional violations, not mere errors of judgment. In making this holding, the Court relied on the reasoning of the U.S. court of appeals:

While federal officials will not be liable for mere mistakes in judgment, whether the mistake is one of fact or one of law, there is no substantial basis for holding that executive officers generally may with impunity discharge their duties in a way that is known to them to violate the Constitution or in a manner that they should know transgresses a clearly established constitutional rule.