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Oil, Gas, And Rhesus Monkeys: A New Framework For Natural Resources Under The Commercial Activity Exception, Madelaine J. Horn

Cornell International Law Journal

The Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act of 1976 (FSIA) constitutes an exception for sovereign states to the normal jurisdictional rules that govern when parties are subject to suit in US courts. The commercial activity provision is a carveout within that broad exception-it deprives sovereign states of their exceptional immunity when they engage in commercial conduct. Within this framework, courts have used the natural resource rule to circumvent the commercial activity carveout and restore immunity to sovereign states. This Note argues that the rule should be abandoned in favor of a much more limited test, thereby increasing the number of sovereign states …