As regular readers are aware, this space tends toward the really eye-catchy stuff. The stuff that the lay reader has real interest in. Like 1292(a)(3) appeals and what-have-you. Or in this case, personal jurisdiction.
Let’s say you’re on a navy ship and you’re in the South China Sea and your ship collides with another ship and you get hurt. You can probably sue that other ship in its home country (but that’d be determined by its home country) but that doesn’t sound great to you, right? Imagine going to Japan, say, for the application of Japanese law, and speaking with your lawyer over there, and trying to figure out their legal system. Much better to sue in the U.S. But where?
A lot of really weird and important questions arise. First off, where in the Constitution does it say where you can get sued? It’s right there in the 5th and 14th Amendments: due process. How much do Japanese companies get to avail themselves of the 5th and 14th Amendments though? Can you sue them in Idaho? That hardly seems fair, right?
The plaintiffs (who were in fact on a navy ship and there was a collision overseas) say this is the test:
whether a defendant, sued on a federal claim, was doing enough systematic and continuous business in the United States that it had fair notice it could be subjected to suit in federal courts.
The Fifth Circuit, en banc, over a lot of back-and-forth, said "no.” It said that the same personal jursidction test applies to foreign people and companies as to domestic people and companies. Gotta sue in Japan.
One lemma: there is an argument that admiralty has special rules. If the ship that had done the colliding were in the U.S., then the plaintiffs could have arrested it.