Article III, Section 2, Clause 1:

The judicial Power shall extend to all Cases, in Law and Equity, arising under this Constitution, the Laws of the United States, and Treaties made, or which shall be made, under their Authority;—to all Cases affecting Ambassadors, other public Ministers and Consuls;—to all Cases of admiralty and maritime Jurisdiction;—to Controversies to which the United States shall be a Party;—to Controversies between two or more States;—between a State and Citizens of another State,—between Citizens of different States,—between Citizens of the same State claiming Lands under Grants of different States, and between a State, or the Citizens thereof, and foreign States, Citizens or Subjects.

In Article III of the Constitution, the Framers granted the federal judiciary jurisdiction over “admiralty and maritime” cases to ensure that courts would apply uniform rules in deciding cases that could affect domestic commerce and might implicate foreign affairs.1 In the Judiciary Act of 1789, Congress conferred exclusive admiralty jurisdiction on the federal district courts2 while preserving concurrent state court jurisdiction over common law remedies so that the states could supplement the administration of federal maritime law.3

In practice, state courts retain concurrent jurisdiction over most contract and tort cases that fall within federal admiralty jurisdiction because a plaintiff may bring a personal action seeking common law remedies against an individual defendant in most of these cases.4 In an in personam case5 under the common law, liability attaches to property only to the extent of the individual defendant’s title in that property.6 When bringing such maritime actions against defendants, the plaintiff may choose either federal or state court.

By contrast, the Supreme Court has held that, as a matter of statute, federal courts have exclusive admiralty jurisdiction over cases in which the plaintiff seeks remedies for maritime torts or contracts that lie against property in rem (e.g., the seizure of a vessel to enforce a maritime lien).7 For example, the Court held invalid a California court’s application of a statute that allowed the state’s courts to subject vessels to condemnation and sale in lawsuits brought directly against the vessels for breaches of maritime contracts.8 The Court determined that the federal courts traditionally had exclusive jurisdiction under the Judiciary Act over such in rem admiralty proceedings.9 Such actions were not saved by the Judiciary Act’s savings clause because they were based on civil (i.e., statutory) law rather than common law.10

Other in rem cases that are subject to the federal courts’ exclusive jurisdiction include cases involving limitation of a shipowner’s liability;11 prize, capture, and seizure cases;12 and suits against the United States.13 Only a federal court sitting in admiralty may enforce a maritime lien, which may arise, for example, out of a maritime contract or tort.14 State legislatures may enact laws providing for state court jurisdiction over in rem maritime actions only in certain, narrowly defined circumstances.15

In the absence of controlling federal maritime law, courts have sometimes applied substantive state law in admiralty cases when it would not interfere with the uniformity of federal maritime law.16 For example, in Southern Pacific Co v. Jensen, the Supreme Court held that a state could not apply its workers’ compensation law to stevedores injured when unloading a ship at a wharf in navigable waters under a maritime contract.17 The Court reasoned that workers’ compensation was not a common law remedy preserved for the state courts under the Judiciary Act, and that its application would interfere with the general maritime law’s uniformity in violation of the Constitution.18 In Knickerbocker Ice Co. v. Stewart, the Court held that Congress could not authorize the states to establish their own workers’ compensation laws for maritime employees.19 Although the Constitution permits Congress to legislate on maritime rights, obligations, and remedies, it forbids Congress from delegating its power to the states to create new rights by permitting the states to modify the maritime law in a manner that would “work material injury” to the “characteristic features” of the law or interfere with its uniformity.20

Other provisions of the Constitution may also influence federal admiralty jurisdiction. For example, the Eleventh Amendment prohibits federal courts sitting in admiralty from entertaining jurisdiction over lawsuits brought in rem against state-chartered vessels without the state’s consent.21 However, the Eleventh Amendment does not bar admiralty courts from hearing lawsuits in rem in which litigants seek to recover state property, like a shipwreck, that the state does not actually possess.22

Footnotes

1

The Lottawanna, 88 U.S. (21 Wall.) 558, 575 (1874). See also Chelentis v. Luckenbach S.S. Co., 247 U.S. 372, 381-82 (1918).

2

State courts may also lack jurisdiction over maritime cases as a result of federal preemption. See, e.g., Maryland Casualty Co. v. Cushing, 347 U.S. 409, 415 (1954) (holding that federal law limiting a shipowner’s liability preempted a state statute authorizing direct suit against an insurance company).

3

28 U.S.C. § 1333(1). If the Judiciary Act’s “saving to suitors” clause authorizes a litigant to bring suit in state court, the plaintiff may also choose to bring its claims on the “law side” of a federal court and obtain a jury if an independent basis for jurisdiction exists (e.g., diversity of citizenship) and the amount-in-controversy requirement is satisfied. Seas Shipping Co. v. Sieracki, 328 U.S. 85, 88-89 (1946). See also, e.g., Fitzgerald v. United States Lines Co., 374 U.S. 16, 20-21 (1963) (holding that admiralty claims joined with a Jones Act claim must be submitted to a jury “when both arise out of one set of facts” ); Panama R.R. Co. v. Johnson, 264 U.S. 375, 388 (1924) (upholding suit on a federal court’s “law side” for a Jones Act claim as consistent with Congress’s power to “alter, qualify or supplement the maritime rules” ). See also 46 U.S.C. § 30104. Jones Act claims may also be brought in state court. Panama R.R., 271 U.S. at 561.

4

Atl. & Gulf Stevedores, Inc. v. Ellerman Lines, Ltd., 369 U.S. 355, 359-60 (1962) ( “[An in personam] suit for breach of a maritime contract, while it may be brought in admiralty, may also be pursued in an ordinary civil action.” ); Red Cross Line v. Atl. Fruit Co., 264 U.S. 109, 123 (1924) ( “By reason of the saving clause, state courts have jurisdiction in personam, concurrent with the admiralty courts, of all causes of action maritime in their nature arising under charter parties.” ); Knapp, Stout & Co. v. McCaffrey, 177 U.S. 638, 643, 648 (1900) (holding that a state court could enforce a lien on a vessel for towage charges because the plaintiff had brought suit in personam against individual defendants rather than in rem against the vessel, placing the claims within the savings clause).

The Supreme Court has held that, in general, federal admiralty courts cannot issue some forms of equitable relief (e.g., ordering specific performance of a contract). In re The Steamer Eclipse, 135 U.S. 599, 608 (1890). But see Swift & Co. Packers v. Compania Colombiana del Caribe, 339 U.S. 684, 690-93 (1950).

5

Generally, in personam jurisdiction refers to a court’s power over a person (or entity) who is a party to, or involved in, a case or controversy before the court, including its power to render judgments affecting that person’s rights. Black’s Law Dictionary 982 (10th ed. 2014).

6

A case does not fall within federal courts’ exclusive admiralty jurisdiction merely because it involves the issuance of an “auxiliary attachment” against the vessel. Rounds v. Cloverport Foundry & Machine Co., 237 U.S. 303, 306 (1915). In exercising in personam jurisdiction, a state court may “adopt such remedies, and . . . attach to them such incidents, as it sees fit so long as it does not attempt to make changes in the substantive maritime law.” Am. Dredging Co. v. Miller, 510 U.S. 443, 447 (1994) (internal quotation marks omitted). See also Madruga v. Superior Court, 346 U.S. 556, 561-63 (1954) (upholding state court jurisdiction over a lawsuit seeking a judicial order directing the sale of a vessel and the partition of its proceeds, in part, because the Court could not foresee any “possible injury to commerce or navigation if states continue to be free to follow their own customary partition procedures” and “the state court in this proceeding acts only upon the interests of the parties over whom it has jurisdiction in personam” ).

7

Am. Dredging Co., 510 U.S. at 446; The Robert W. Parsons, 191 U.S. 17, 37 (1903); The Hine v. Trevor, 71 U.S. 555, 569 (1866); The Moses Taylor, 71 U.S. (4 Wall.) 411, 427 (1866). In in rem admiralty proceedings, the court takes custody of the res or property. The property itself is made the defendant in the case, and parties who have an interest in it “may appear” and each “propound independently his interest.” Taylor v. Carryl, 61 U.S. (20 How.) 583, 599 (1858) (vessel as a res). See also United States v. Freights, 274 U.S. 466, 470 (1927) (debt as a res).

8

The Moses Taylor, 71 U.S. (4 Wall.) at 424-25, 431.

9

Id. at 427.

10

Id. at 431.

11

Ex parte Green, 286 U.S. 437, 439-40 (1932) ( “[T]he state court has no jurisdiction to determine the question of the owner’s right to a limited liability, and [if] the value of the vessel be not accepted as the limit of the owner’s liability, the federal court is authorized to resume jurisdiction and dispose of the whole case.” ).

12

28 U.S.C. §§ 1333, 1356. See also 10 U.S.C. ch. 883.

13

In rem proceedings cannot successfully be maintained against a vessel that is U.S. government property without the federal government’s consent. See The Siren, 74 U.S. (7 Wall.) 152, 154 (1869). Suits against the federal government for injury caused by a U.S.-owned vessel’s negligence may be brought under the Suits in Admiralty Act. See generally 46 U.S.C. ch. 309. For further discussion of the United States’ immunity from suit, see .

14

Federal admiralty jurisdiction is exclusive when litigants seek to enforce a lien created on a vessel or its cargo under general maritime law. See Cutler v. Rae, 48 U.S. (7 How.) 729, 731 (1849). States cannot enforce maritime liens in rem. The Glide, 167 U.S. 606, 623-24 (1897). See also Moran v. Sturges, 154 U.S. 256, 283 (1894); Edwards v. Elliott, 88 U.S. (21 Wall.) 532, 557 (1874); Leon v. Galceran, 78 U.S. (11 Wall.) 185, 190 (1871). However, when a tort is not maritime, a litigant may pursue the lien’s enforcement in state court when state law provides a lien on the vessel. Johnson v. Chi. & Pac. Elevator Co., 119 U.S. 388, 399-400 (1886).

15

C. J. Hendry Co. v. Moore, 318 U.S. 133, 134, 153 (1943) (upholding a California law authorizing state courts to exercise jurisdiction in a forfeiture proceeding involving a purse net seized from a fishing boat in navigable waters for violating state law because in rem forfeiture proceedings for violations of state law had long been recognized as a common law remedy not within federal courts’ exclusive admiralty jurisdiction).

16

Knickerbocker Ice Co. v. Stewart, 253 U.S. 149, 158-59 (1920). See also Goett v. Union Carbide Corp., 361 U.S. 340, 342 (1960) (holding that, in a wrongful death case, state law may supply the standard for liability in a maritime tort that arises within the state’s territorial jurisdiction); Wilburn Boat Co. v. Fireman’s Fund Ins. Co., 348 U.S. 310, 320–21 (1955) (holding that state law governed the effect of marine insurance warranties when Congress had left regulation of marine insurance to the states).

In other cases, such as those involving maritime torts in a state’s territorial waters, state law may supplement federal maritime law with additional remedies if not preempted under federal law. For example, states may supplement federal maritime law with additional remedies for maritime torts in some circumstances. E.g., Yamaha Motor Corp. v. Calhoun, 516 U.S. 199, 202, 215 (1996) (upholding against a preemption challenge state remedies for the wrongful death of a non-seafarer in state territorial waters in the absence of federal remedies).

17

S. Pac. Co. v. Jensen, 244 U.S. 205, 217–18 (1917).

18

Id. See also N. Coal & Dock Co. v. Strand, 278 U.S. 142, 145 (1928); Clyde S.S. Co. v. Walker, 244 U.S. 255, 257 (1917). The Supreme Court had previously allowed the states to regulate some aspects of maritime workers’ compensation. Sultan R. & T. Co. v. Dep’t of Labor & Indus., 277 U.S. 135, 136–37 (1928) (upholding state law requiring companies to report number and wages of men employed and pay premiums into the state’s workers’ compensation fund); Grant Smith-Porter Ship Co. v. Rohde, 257 U.S. 469, 477 (1922) ( “[A]s to certain local matters regulation of which would work no material prejudice to the general maritime law, the rules of the latter might be modified or supplemented by state statutes.” ).

19

See Knickerbocker Ice Co., 253 U.S. at 160, 163-64.

20

Id. at 158–60, 164. See also Wash. v. W. C. Dawson & Co., 264 U.S. 219, 227-28 (1924). In 1927, Congress responded to decisions such as Knickerbocker and Jensen by enacting the Longshore and Harbor Workers’ Compensation Act, a federal framework that provides for the payment of compensation to certain maritime workers for job-related injuries. 33 U.S.C. §§ 901–950.

21

Ex parte New York, 256 U.S. 490, 494, 497 (1921). See also Ex parte New York, 256 U.S. 503, 510–11 (1921) (determining that a claimant could not maintain suit against a state-owned vessel in rem when the state employed the vessel solely for its use); Workman v. New York City, 179 U.S. 552, 565 (1900) (holding that a municipal corporation like New York City is subject to admiralty jurisdiction in an in personam maritime tort action because the city may sue and be sued).

22

Cal. v. Deep Sea Research, 523 U.S. 491, 506–07 (1998).