Owen held that cities—as opposed to their officials or employees—could not claim any form of immunity defense when sued for monetary relief under § 1983. In doing so, the Court resolved an important question that the Court had expressly left open in Monell. 

Beginning in 1951, the Supreme Court had issued a series of opinions holding that state and local officials could assert either absolute or qualified immunity.  Absolute immunity protected some officials (e.g., legislators, judges, and prosecutors) regardless of their motives and regardless of how clearly their actions violated the plaintiff’s rights.  Qualified immunity provided more limited protection to most other officials and employees, immunizing them only if they acted in subjective good faith and only if they did not violate the victim’s clearly established constitutional rights.  (In 1982, this qualified immunity standard was modified by eliminating the subjective component.)  The question of whether any immunity defenses would be available to cities themselves did not arise since, until Monell, cities were not subject to § 1983 at all.  Monell itself left the issue open, stating only that cities could not be absolutely immune.

Justice Brennan’s opinion in Owen seemed to promise that every victim of a constitutional wrong could expect full compensatory relief—either from the officials who caused the harm or, if the officials were immune, from the city that employed them.   But that promise was undermined by subsequent cases that narrowed the scope of municipal liability under Monell and broadened the situations in which individual officials would be immune.  Nonetheless, Owen continues to make cities inviting targets for victims of constitutional violations that result from official municipal policy.