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Full-Text Articles in Law

An Active Learning Approach To Teaching Tough Topics: Personal Jurisdiction As An Example, Cynthia M. Ho Jun 2019

An Active Learning Approach To Teaching Tough Topics: Personal Jurisdiction As An Example, Cynthia M. Ho

Cynthia M Ho

No abstract provided.


Plaintiff Personal Jurisdiction And Venue Transfer, Scott Dodson Dec 2018

Plaintiff Personal Jurisdiction And Venue Transfer, Scott Dodson

Scott Dodson

Personal jurisdiction usually focuses on the rights of the defendant. That is because a plaintiff implicitly consents to personal jurisdiction in the court where the plaintiff chooses to file. But what if the defendant seeks to transfer venue to a court in a state in which the plaintiff has no contacts and never consented to personal jurisdiction? Lower courts operate on the assumption that, in both ordinary venue-transfer cases under 28 U.S.C. § 1404(a) and multidistrict-litigation cases under § 1407(a), personal-jurisdiction concerns for plaintiffs simply do not apply. I contest that assumption. Neither statute expands the statutory authorization of federal-court …


Jurisdiction In The Trump Era, Scott Dodson Dec 2017

Jurisdiction In The Trump Era, Scott Dodson

Scott Dodson

The next four years—and perhaps beyond—are likely to solidify two recent trends in jurisdictional doctrine favoring defense interests. First, the narrowing of personal jurisdiction has given defendants more opportunities to secure home-state advantage and, as an ancillary matter, hinder plaintiff-friendly aggregation. This narrowing is likely to continue in light of President Trump’s judicial appointments and the disinclination of Congress and rulemakers to expand personal jurisdiction in federal court. Second, recent expansions of diversity jurisdiction allow defendants to invoke favorable federal procedures and interstate venue transfer. Despite longstanding calls to reduce the scope of diversity jurisdiction, Congress is trending in the …


Personal Jurisdiction And Aliens, Scott Dodson, William Dodge Dec 2017

Personal Jurisdiction And Aliens, Scott Dodson, William Dodge

Scott Dodson

The increasing prevalence of noncitizens in U.S. civil litigation raises a fundamental question for the doctrine of personal jurisdiction: how should the alienage status of a defendant affect personal jurisdiction? This fundamental question comes at a time of increasing Supreme Court focus on personal jurisdiction, in cases like Bristol-Myers Squibb v. Superior Court, Daimler AG v. Bauman, and J. McIntyre Machinery, Ltd. v. Nicastro. We aim to answer that question by offering a theory of alienage personal jurisdiction. Under this theory, alienage status broadens the geographic range for minimum contacts from a single state to the whole …


Personal Jurisdiction And Aggregation, Scott Dodson Dec 2017

Personal Jurisdiction And Aggregation, Scott Dodson

Scott Dodson

Aggregation—the ability to join parties or claims in a federal civil lawsuit—has usually been governed by subject-matter jurisdiction, claim and issue preclusion, and the joinder rules. These doctrines have tended to favor aggregation because of its efficiency, consistency, and predictability. Yet aggregation is suddenly under attack from a new threat, one that has little to do with aggregation directly: personal jurisdiction. In this Article, I chronicle how a recent restrictive turn to personal jurisdiction—especially though modern cases narrowing general jurisdiction and last Term’s blockbuster case Bristol-Myers Squibb—threatens the salutary benefits of aggregation across a number of areas, including simple …


The Other Side Of The Rabbit Hole: Reconciling Recent Supreme Court Personal Jurisdiction Jurisprudence With Jurisdiction To Terminate Parental Rights, Joan M. Shaughnessy May 2016

The Other Side Of The Rabbit Hole: Reconciling Recent Supreme Court Personal Jurisdiction Jurisprudence With Jurisdiction To Terminate Parental Rights, Joan M. Shaughnessy

Joan M. Shaughnessy

This Essay contrasts the jurisdictional regime followed in termination of parental rights and other child custody cases with the regime that has dominated recent Supreme Court personal jurisdiction cases. Jurisdiction in child custody cases has long been based upon the connection of the child, not the defendant parent, to the jurisdiction. Recent Supreme Court cases, on the other hand, have focused nearly exclusively on the defendant’s connection to the forum state. This Essay argues that the Supreme Court cases betray a failure of the Court to provide a consistent constitutional justification for the jurisdictional limitations it has imposed. The Essay …


The Supreme Court's New Approach To Personal Jurisdiction, Bernadette Bollas Genetin Jan 2015

The Supreme Court's New Approach To Personal Jurisdiction, Bernadette Bollas Genetin

Bernadette Bollas Genetin

The Supreme Court has returned to the issue of whether a “reasonableness” analysis or an “interstate federalism” focus underlies personal jurisdiction doctrine. It has, thus, renewed the debate regarding whether the so-called “forward-looking” or “backward-looking” face of International Shoe should control.

This Article explores two 2014 cases in which the Court took strides toward implementing a liberty interest, or reasonableness, view of personal jurisdiction. In the first case, Daimler AG v. Bauman, the Court introduced a new, narrower approach to general jurisdiction. Under Bauman’s more constrained analysis, general jurisdiction will be available primarily in an individual’s domicile and a corporation’s …


Party Subordinance In Federal Litigation, Scott Dodson Dec 2013

Party Subordinance In Federal Litigation, Scott Dodson

Scott Dodson

American civil litigation in federal courts operates under a presumption of party dominance. Parties choose the lawsuit structure, factual predicates, and legal arguments, and the court accepts these choices. Further, parties enter ubiquitous ex ante agreements that purport to alter the law governing their dispute, along with a chorus of calls for even more party-driven customization of litigation. The assumption behind this model of party dominance is that parties substantially control both the law that will govern their dispute and the judges that oversee it. This Article challenges that assumption by offering a reoriented model of party subordinance. Under my …


On Bringing The Justice Mission Conference Back Home, Marjorie A. Silver Jul 2011

On Bringing The Justice Mission Conference Back Home, Marjorie A. Silver

Marjorie A. Silver

No abstract provided.


"Defendant Veto" Or "Totality Of The Circumstances?": It's Time For The Supreme Court To Straighten Out The Personal Jurisdiction Standard Once Again, Robert J. Condlin May 2008

"Defendant Veto" Or "Totality Of The Circumstances?": It's Time For The Supreme Court To Straighten Out The Personal Jurisdiction Standard Once Again, Robert J. Condlin

Robert J. Condlin

Commentators frequently claim that there is no single, coherent doctrine of extra-territorial personal jurisdiction, and, unfortunately, they are correct. The International Shoe case, commonly (but inaccurately) thought of as the wellspring of the modern form of the doctrine, announced a relatively straightforward, two-factor, four-permutation test that worked well for resolving most cases. In the nearly sixty-year period following Shoe, however, as the Supreme Court expanded and refined the standard, what was once straightforward and uncomplicated became serendipitous and convoluted. Two general, and generally incompatible, versions of the doctrine competed for dominance. The first, what might best be described as a …


Showdown At The Domain Name Corral: Property Rights And Personal Jurisdiction Over Squatters, Poachers And Other Parasites, Ira Nathenson Jan 1997

Showdown At The Domain Name Corral: Property Rights And Personal Jurisdiction Over Squatters, Poachers And Other Parasites, Ira Nathenson

Ira Steven Nathenson

This paper on domain names disputes has two main goals. The first is to analyze the principal points of litigation in domain name disputes, namely, personal jurisdiction and trademark liability. The second is to propose an analytic framework to better help resolve matters of jurisdiction and liability. Regarding personal jurisdiction, domain names are problematic because an internet site can be viewed almost anywhere, potentially subjecting the domain name owner to suit everywhere. For example, should a Florida domain name owner automatically be subject to suit in Alaska where the site can be viewed? If not, then where? Regarding liability, trademark …