Law Commons^™

A New Look At The Original Meaning Of The Diversity Clause, Mark Moller

College of Law Faculty

Must a federal court obtain the power to bind a party before her citizenship becomes relevant to diversity jurisdiction under Article III? For a long time conventional wisdom has assumed the answer is "no": Article III allows Congress to authorize diversity jurisdiction based on the citizenship of persons beyond a court's power to bind at the time jurisdiction is tested. Congress, in turn, has acted on this assumption. Key provisions of the most ambitious, and controversial, expansion of diversity jurisdiction in the last decade, the 2005 Class Action Fairness Act (CAFA), hinge diversity jurisdiction on the citizenship of persons conventionally …