Opinion of the Court nity from suit if the "tradition of immunity was so firmly rooted in the common law and was supported by such strong policy reasons that 'Congress would have specifically so provided had it wished to abolish the doctrine."" Owen v. City of Independence, 445 U. S. 622, 637 (1980) (quoting Pierson v. Ray, 386 U. S. 547, 555 (1967)). If parties seeking immunity were shielded from tort liability when Congress enacted the Civil Rights Act of 1871-§1 of which is codified at 42 U. S. C. §1983-we infer from legislative silence that Congress did not intend to abrogate such immunities when it imposed liability for actions taken under color of state law. See Tower v. Glover, 467 U. S. 914, 920 (1984); Imbler, supra, at 421; Pulliam v. Allen, 466 U. S. 522, 529 (1984). Additionally, irrespective of the common law support, we will not recognize an immunity available at common law if § 1983's history or purpose counsel against applying it in § 1983 actions. Tower, supra, at 920. See also Imbler, supra, at 424-429. In determining whether there was an immunity at common law that Congress intended to incorporate in the Civil Rights Act, we look to the most closely analogous torts-in this case, malicious prosecution and abuse of process. At common law, these torts provided causes of action against private defendants for unjustified harm arising out of the misuse of governmental processes. 2 C. Addison, Law of Torts ¶852, and n. 2, ¶868, and n. 1 (1876); T. Cooley, Law of Torts 187-190 (1879); J. Bishop, Commentaries on NonContract Law §§ 228-250, pp. 91-103, § 490, p. 218 (1889). Respondents do not contend that private parties who instituted attachment proceedings and who were subsequently sued for malicious prosecution or abuse of process were entitled to absolute immunity. And with good reason; although public prosecutors and judges were accorded absolute immunity at common law, Imbler v. Pachtman, supra, at 421-424, such protection did not extend to complaining witnesses who, like respondents, set the wheels of government in motion by Opinion of the Court instigating a legal action. Malley v. Briggs, 475 U. S. 335, 340-341 (1986) ("In 1871, the generally accepted rule was that one who procured the issuance of an arrest warrant by submitting a complaint could be held liable if the complaint was made maliciously and without probable cause”). Nonetheless, respondents argue that at common law, private defendants could defeat a malicious prosecution or abuse of process action if they acted without malice and with probable cause, and that we should therefore infer that Congress did not intend to abrogate such defenses when it enacted the Civil Rights Act of 1871. We adopted similar reasoning in Pierson v. Ray, 386 U. S., at 555-557. There, we held that police officers sued for false arrest under § 1983 were entitled to the defense that they acted with probable cause and in good faith when making an arrest under a statute they reasonably believed was valid. We recognized this defense because peace officers were accorded protection from liability at common law if they arrested an individual in good faith, even if the innocence of such person were later established. Ibid. The rationale we adopted in Pierson is of no avail to respondents here. Even if there were sufficient common law support to conclude that respondents, like the police officers in Pierson, should be entitled to a good faith defense, that would still not entitle them to what they sought and obtained in the courts below: the qualified immunity from suit accorded government officials under Harlow v. Fitzgerald, 457 U. S. 800 (1982). In Harlow, we altered the standard of qualified immunity adopted in our prior § 1983 cases because we recognized that "[t]he subjective element of the good-faith defense frequently [had] prove[d] incompatible with our admonition . . . that insubstantial claims should not proceed to trial." Id., at 815-816. Because of the attendant harms to government effectiveness caused by lengthy judicial inquiry into subjective motivation, we concluded that "bare allegations of malice Opinion of the Court should not suffice to subject government officials either to the costs of trial or to the burdens of broad-reaching discovery." Id., at 817-818. Accordingly, we held that government officials performing discretionary functions are shielded from "liability for civil damages insofar as their conduct [did] not violate clearly established statutory or constitutional rights of which a reasonable person would have known." Id., at 818. This wholly objective standard, we concluded, would "avoid excessive disruption of government and permit the resolution of many insubstantial claims on summary judgment." Ibid. That Harlow "completely reformulated qualified immunity along principles not at all embodied in the common law," Anderson v. Creighton, 483 U. S. 635, 645 (1987), was reinforced by our decision in Mitchell v. Forsyth, 472 U. S. 511 (1985). Mitchell held that Harlow established an "immunity from suit rather than a mere defense to liability," which, like an absolute immunity, "is effectively lost if a case is erroneously permitted to go to trial." 472 U. S., at 526 (emphasis supplied). Thus, we held in Mitchell that the denial of qualified immunity should be immediately appealable. Id., at 530. It is this type of objectively determined, immediately appealable immunity that respondents asserted below.2 But, 2 In arguing that respondents are entitled to qualified immunity under Harlow v. Fitzgerald, 457 U. S. 800 (1982), the dissent mixes apples and oranges. Even if we were to agree with the dissent's proposition that elements a plaintiff was required to prove as part of her case in chief could somehow be construed as a "defense,"" post, at 176, n. 1, and that this "defense" entitles private citizens to some protection from liability, we cannot agree that respondents are entitled to immunity from suit under Harlow. One could reasonably infer from the fact that a plaintiff's malicious prosecution or abuse of process action failed if she could not affirmatively establish both malice and want of probable cause that plaintiffs bringing an analogous suit under §1983 should be required to make a similar showing to sustain a § 1983 cause of action. Alternatively, if one accepts the dissent's characterization of the common law as establishing an affirmative "defense" for private defendants, then one could also conclude that private parties sued under § 1983 should likewise be entitled to Opinion of the Court as our precedents make clear, the reasons for recognizing such an immunity were based not simply on the existence of a good faith defense at common law, but on the special policy concerns involved in suing government officials. Harlow, supra, at 813; Mitchell, supra, at 526. Reviewing these concerns, we conclude that the rationales mandating qualified immunity for public officials are not applicable to private parties. Qualified immunity strikes a balance between compensating those who have been injured by official conduct and protecting government's ability to perform its traditional functions. Harlow, supra, at 819; Pierson, supra, at 554; Anderson, supra, at 638. Accordingly, we have recognized qualified immunity for government officials where it was necessary to preserve their ability to serve the public good or to ensure that talented candidates were not deterred by the threat of damages suits from entering public service. See, e. g., Wood v. Strickland, 420 U. S. 308, 319 (1975) (denial of qualified immunity to school board officials "would contribute not to principled and fearless decision-making but to intimidation'") (quoting Pierson, supra, at 554); Butz v. Economou, 438 U. S. 478, 506 (1978) (immunity for Presidential aides warranted partly "to protect officials who are required to exercise their discretion and the related public interest in encouraging the vigorous exercise of official authority"); Mitchell, supra, at 526 (immunity designed to prevent the "distraction of officials from their governmental duties, inhibition of discretionary action, and deterrence of able people from public service'" (quoting Harlow, supra, at 816)). In assert an affirmative defense based on a similar showing of good faith and/ or probable cause. In neither case, however, is it appropriate to make the dissent's leap: that because these common law torts partially included an objective component-probable cause-private defendants sued under § 1983 should be entitled to the objectively determined, immediately appealable immunity from suit accorded certain government officials under Harlow. Opinion of the Court short, the qualified immunity recognized in Harlow acts to safeguard government, and thereby to protect the public at large, not to benefit its agents. These rationales are not transferable to private parties. Although principles of equality and fairness may suggest, as respondents argue, that private citizens who rely unsuspectingly on state laws they did not create and may have no reason to believe are invalid should have some protection from liability, as do their government counterparts, such interests are not sufficiently similar to the traditional purposes of qualified immunity to justify such an expansion. Unlike school board members, see Wood, supra, or police officers, see Malley v. Briggs, 475 U. S. 335 (1986), or Presidential aides, see Butz, supra, private parties hold no office requiring them to exercise discretion; nor are they principally concerned with enhancing the public good. Accordingly, extending Harlow qualified immunity to private parties would have no bearing on whether public officials are able to act forcefully and decisively in their jobs or on whether qualified applicants enter public service. Moreover, unlike with government officials performing discretionary functions, the public interest will not be unduly impaired if private individuals are required to proceed to trial to resolve their legal disputes. In short, the nexus between private parties and the historic purposes of qualified immunity is simply too attenuated to justify such an extension of our doctrine of immunity. For these reasons, we can offer no relief today. The question on which we granted certiorari is a very narrow one: “[W]hether private persons, who conspire with state officials to violate constitutional rights, have available the good faith immunity applicable to public officials." Pet. for Cert. i. The precise issue encompassed in this question, and the only issue decided by the lower courts, is whether qualified immunity, as enunciated in Harlow, is available for private defendants faced with § 1983 liability for invoking a state replevin, |