Case Title: Donaldson v. National Marine

Citation: 

Docket Number: S110301

State: california

Court: California Supreme Court

Date: 2005-03-14T00:00:00Z

Document:
1 
Filed 3/14/05 
 
 
 
IN THE SUPREME COURT OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 
 
RICHARD DONALDSON, 
) 
 
 
) 
 
Plaintiff and Respondent, 
) 
 
 
) 
S110301 
 
v. 
) 
 
 
) 
Ct.App. 1/1  
NATIONAL MARINE, INC., 
) 
A092876 and A093705 
 
) 
San Francisco 
 
Defendant and Appellant. 
) 
Super. Ct. No. 998145 
___________________________________ ) 
 
In this case, involving a maritime injury occurring beyond state borders, we 
consider whether the trial court had jurisdiction to entertain a wrongful death 
claim under the federal Jones Act (46 U.S.C. Appen. § 688 et seq.), legislation that 
provides remedies for injury or death to seamen occurring in the course of their 
employment.  We conclude that indeed our state courts possess concurrent 
jurisdiction with federal courts over such Jones Act claims, and that the trial court 
properly exercised such jurisdiction in this case.   
FACTS 
The following uncontested facts are taken largely from the Court of 
Appeal’s decision in this case.  National Marine, Inc. (defendant) appeals from a 
judgment, entered after a jury trial, awarding Richard Donaldson (plaintiff) 
$1,616,400 on an action for the wrongful death of plaintiff’s adoptive father, a 
Tennessee resident, Albert Pavolini (decedent).  Decedent spent his adult working 
life on or around boats and ships.  He served in the United States Navy from 1942 
 
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until 1964.  He worked for Military Sea Transport from 1966 to 1967; he worked 
for National Marine (then Cardinal Carriers) from 1967 to 1981; and he worked 
for other private shipping companies from 1980 until he retired a few years later.  
Decedent’s duties both for the Navy and for the private shipping companies 
included installing or repairing insulation around pipes and waterlines, and he was 
exposed to asbestos both during his Naval career and later, while working for the 
private companies.   
Decedent also began smoking at age 16 and smoked until 1984.  In May 
1997, he was diagnosed with lung cancer.  He died in 1998 of complications 
resulting from the cancer.  These proceedings began before decedent’s death, 
when he filed suit against multiple defendants, including several tobacco 
companies, on the theory that his lung cancer was caused by a combination of his 
use of tobacco and his exposure to asbestos during his naval career and his 
employment with the private shipping companies.  Although it is unclear from the 
record, it appears that the named defendants originally included companies that 
manufactured or supplied products containing asbestos to the Navy or to the 
private shipping companies.  In any event, the parties ultimately stipulated to 
orders severing the tobacco defendants from the asbestos defendants for separate 
trial, and we are not concerned with those proceedings here.   
On September 25, 1999, plaintiff filed suit against defendant as the 
successor to Cardinal Carriers, seeking damages for decedent’s death under the 
Jones Act, and under the maritime doctrine of unseaworthiness.  Defendant moved 
to dismiss on the theory that the state court lacked subject matter jurisdiction over 
plaintiff’s maritime claims because decedent’s work for Cardinal Carriers took 
place outside of California’s territorial waters.  The motion was denied, and the 
matter went to trial.   
 
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At trial, defendant did not dispute that decedent died of lung cancer.  It 
defended on the theory that the cancer was unrelated to his exposure to asbestos, 
and resulted from his history of smoking.  Defendant also theorized that even if 
exposure to asbestos was a factor in decedent’s lung cancer, tobacco was a greater 
factor.  Finally, it argued that in any event decedent’s exposure to asbestos during 
his naval career was far greater than his exposure to asbestos while working for 
Cardinal Carriers.   
The jury rejected plaintiff’s unseaworthiness claims, and they are not before 
us.  It found, however, that defendant was negligent under the Jones Act, and that 
its negligence was a cause of decedent’s death.  The jury further fixed the damages 
at $1,796,000, and apportioned fault between decedent, defendant, the Navy and 
the tobacco companies, at 10 percent for decedent, and 30 percent each for 
defendant, the Navy and the tobacco companies.   
Defendant appealed from the judgment.  The trial court later denied 
defendant’s motions for a new trial and for judgment notwithstanding the verdict, 
but granted plaintiff’s motion to amend the judgment to make defendant liable for 
90 percent of the jury’s verdict.  The court found that the Navy and the tobacco 
companies were immune from these claims, and that defendant, accordingly, was 
liable for the full amount of damages, less the 10 percent attributable to decedent’s 
fault.  The court therefore corrected its judgment to increase the award against 
defendant to $1,616,400.  Defendant filed a second appeal from the court’s order, 
and those appeals were consolidated.   
The Court of Appeal ruled in favor of plaintiff on the jurisdictional issue, 
concluding that “California’s courts have subject matter jurisdiction over deaths 
occurring outside of the state’s territorial limits, although they may be required to 
apply the law of the jurisdiction where the wrong occurred.  For purposes of this 
case, that law is the Jones Act.  As the Jones Act recognizes a claim for wrongful 
 
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death, the superior court was entitled to hear [plaintiff’s] claims.”  We granted 
review limited to this jurisdictional issue and will affirm the judgment of the Court 
of Appeal. 
DISCUSSION 
1.  May California Courts Properly Exercise Concurrent Jurisdiction 
Over Jones Act Cases? 
Initially we consider whether California state courts properly may exercise 
concurrent jurisdiction over Jones Act cases.  The Jones Act was passed in 1920 as 
the Merchant Marine Act to extend the protections of the Federal Employers’ 
Liability Act (FELA, 45 USC § 51 et seq.) to seamen.  The act provides seamen or 
their survivors a remedy against employers for negligence resulting in injury or 
death in the course of employment.  (See 46 U.S.C. Appen. § 688.)  Companion 
legislation, the Death on High Seas Act (DOHSA, 46 U.S.C. Appen. § 761), was 
enacted, also in 1920, to provide the representatives of deceased seamen whose 
deaths occurred more than three miles from shore the right to sue in federal court 
for wrongful death damages.   
As defendant acknowledges, the federal courts have determined that both 
the Jones Act and DOHSA are governed by separate “saving to suitors” clauses 
that preserve concurrent state court jurisdiction over claims coming under these 
statutes.  (See, e.g., Offshore Logistics, Inc. v. Tallentire (1986) 477 U.S. 207, 
221-223 (Offshore Logistics); Engel v. Davenport (1926) 271 U.S. 33, 37 (Engel).)  
With respect to actions brought under the Jones Act, although a statute vests 
federal courts with “exclusive” admiralty or maritime jurisdiction, that same 
statute “sav[es] to suitors in all cases all other remedies to which they are 
otherwise entitled.”  (28 U.S.C. § 1333(1).)  Additionally, FELA, which is 
incorporated by reference into the Jones Act, includes the provision that “[t]he 
jurisdiction of the courts of the United States under this act shall be concurrent 
 
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with that of the courts of the several States.”  (45 U.S.C. § 56, italics added.)  The 
Engel court concluded that, by reason of the predecessors to the foregoing 
statutory provisions, maritime law rights of action may be enforced in either state 
or federal courts.  (Engel, supra, 271 U.S. at pp. 37-38.)   
To support its view that California lacks jurisdiction over Jones Act cases, 
defendant relies on a DOHSA case, Chromy v. Lawrance (1991) 233 Cal.App.3d 
1521 (Chromy), which held that federal courts have exclusive jurisdiction over 
DOHSA wrongful death actions arising outside of territorial waters in the absence 
of enabling state statutory provisions.  Chromy reasoned that suits under DOHSA 
may only be tried in state courts whose states have wrongful death or survivor 
statutes expressly applicable to death on the high seas.  Chromy relied primarily 
on the wording of DOHSA’s own saving clause, preserving state rights of action 
or remedies for death under “provisions of any State statute.”  (46 U.S.C. Appen. 
§ 767.)  Because California’s wrongful death statute (former Code Civ. Proc, 
§ 377, now § 377.60 et seq.) was silent regarding its extraterritorial effect, Chromy 
held that the plaintiff’s suit must be dismissed.  (Chromy, 233 Cal.App.3d at pp. 
1526-1527; see also Gordon v. Reynolds (1960) 187 Cal.App.2d 472, 477; Hughes 
v. Unitech Aircraft Service, Inc. (Fla.Dist.Ct.App. 1995) 662 So.2d 999, 1001.)   
We find Chromy and other DOHSA cases to be of little value here.  First, as 
the Court of Appeal in this case noted, Chromy’s analysis has been seriously 
questioned by a more well-reasoned appellate decision holding that, in light of the 
need for uniformity of remedy and to facilitate effective and just administration of 
DOHSA’s remedies, state court jurisdiction to enforce federal DOHSA claims 
does not depend on specific state statutory authority.  (Garofalo v. Princess 
Cruises, Inc. (2000) 85 Cal.App.4th 1060, 1082.)  Second, Chromy, decided under 
DOHSA, is inapposite here; DOHSA, with its own saving clause (46 U.S.C. 
Appen. § 767), is not governed by the differently worded saving clause and 
 
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mandatory concurrent jurisdiction statute applicable in Jones Act/FELA cases (28 
U.S.C. § 1333; 45 U.S.C. § 56).   
Defendant’s primary position, adopting Chromy’s analysis discussed above, 
is that “the ‘saving to suitors’ clause of the Judiciary Act of 1789 ‘saves’ only 
those rights of action recognized by state law.”  In other words, in defendant’s 
view, a state may elect not to provide a forum for recovery under the Jones Act.  
Defendant notes that in Offshore Logistics, the high court explained that 
“Louisiana had legislative jurisdiction to extend its wrongful death statute to 
remedy deaths on the high seas and that Louisiana in fact intended its statute to 
have that effect.”  (Offshore Logistics, supra, 477 U.S. at p. 211.)  By contrast, 
according to defendant, California has never expressed such a legislative intent.  
Defendant observes that the right to sue for wrongful death is purely statutory, as 
it did not exist at common law.  (Justus v. Atchison (1977) 19 Cal.3d 564, 572;  
Chavez v. Carpenter (2001) 91 Cal.App.4th 1433, 1438-1439.)  Accordingly, the 
right to sue for wrongful death is limited by the statutory provisions creating the 
remedy.  (Justus v. Atchison, supra, 19 Cal.3d at pp. 572, 577.)   
But plaintiff is not suing for wrongful death under state law.  He is seeking to 
enforce a federal cause of action under the Jones act.  As we have seen, the Jones 
Act incorporates by reference a provision of FELA that “[t]he jurisdiction of the 
courts of the United States under this act shall be concurrent with that of the 
courts of the several States.”  (45 U.S.C. § 56, italics added.)  The high court cases 
interpreting this provision make clear that federal supremacy principles prohibit 
state courts of general jurisdiction from refusing to entertain suits under FELA 
solely because suit is brought under federal law (McKnett v. St. Louis & San 
Francisco R. Co. (1934) 292 U.S. 230, 233-234 (McKnett)) or because 
enforcement of the federal right of action is deemed contrary to state policy or apt 
to cause inconvenience and confusion because of differing state and federal 
 
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standards (Mondou v. New York, N.H. & H.R. Co. (1912) 223 U.S. 1, 57-58 
(Mondou)).  Thus, the high court has held that states must entertain suits timely 
filed under the Jones Act despite state limitation statutes that might otherwise bar 
suit.  (Engel, supra, 271 U.S. at pp. 37-39.)   
A more recent high court case, Howlett v. Rose (1990) 496 U.S. 356, 369-372 
(Howlett), confirmed that generally when a statute confers concurrent jurisdiction 
over a federal right of action, federal law becomes enforceable in state courts 
regardless of contrary state policy.  This follows because the federal Constitution’s 
supremacy clause makes that law “the supreme Law of the Land” and as binding 
on the citizens and courts as state laws.  (Id. at p. 367.)  As a consequence, the 
high court explained, a state having jurisdiction over the parties may not refuse to 
enforce a federal right in the absence of a valid excuse consistent with federal law.  
(Id. at pp. 369-372, citing Mondou, supra, 223 U.S. at p. 57; and McKnett, supra, 
292 U.S. at pp. 230, 233-234.)  According to Howlett, a valid excuse for declining 
jurisdiction might involve “a neutral rule of judicial administration,” such as a rule 
permitting dismissal of claims between nonresidents, or application of a doctrine 
such as forum non conveniens.  (Howlett, supra, 496 U.S. at pp. 374-375.)  
Defendant points to no such valid excuse that would permit California courts to 
decline jurisdiction in Jones Act cases.  (See also In re Chimenti (6th Cir. 1996) 79 
F.3d 534, 537-538 [plaintiff seeking to enforce federal maritime law right of 
action may proceed in state or federal court, and action is not subject to removal].)   
Plaintiff observes that the California wrongful death statute contains no 
provision limiting the right of action to deaths occurring within the state’s 
territorial waters.  (See Code Civ. Proc., § 377.60, et seq.)  Plaintiff also notes the 
broad conferral of jurisdiction in the state Constitution and statutes.  (See Cal. 
Const., art. VI, § 10 [except as otherwise provided, “superior courts have original 
jurisdiction in all other causes”]; Code Civ. Proc., § 410.10 [“A court of this state 
 
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may exercise jurisdiction on any basis not inconsistent with the Constitution of 
this state or of the United States”].)  Indeed, plaintiff cites numerous cases in 
which California courts have exercised such maritime or Jones Act jurisdiction.  
(See, e.g., Gault v. Modern Continental/Roadway Construction Co., Inc. Joint 
Venture (2002) 100 Cal.App.4th 991, 997; Hutchins v. Juneau Tanker Corp. 
(1994) 28 Cal.App.4th 493, 495, 499; D’Aquisto v. Campbell Industries (1984) 
162 Cal.App.3d 1208, 1212-1213; Baptiste v. Superior Court (1980) 106 
Cal.App.3d 87, 94.)   
For all the reasons expressed above, we see no valid California impediment 
or “excuse” to preclude the exercise of state court jurisdiction in Jones Act cases.   
2.  Did California Courts Properly Exercise Concurrent Jurisdiction in 
this Case? 
Defendant also argues that, assuming California courts may exercise 
concurrent jurisdiction to hear wrongful death claims under the Jones Act, 
plaintiff’s suit should have nonetheless been dismissed because California lacked 
sufficient jurisdictional interest in this case to adjudicate his Jones Act claim.  
Defendant observes that neither decedent Paviolini nor plaintiff, his adoptive son, 
were California residents, and the allegedly tortious conduct occurred outside of 
California.  Although plaintiff’s complaint alleged that defendant is a corporation 
regularly doing business in California, defendant complains that plaintiff “has 
failed throughout the action to cite facts supporting that contention.”  In such 
circumstances, according to defendant, California was an improper forum to hear 
the case.   
Plaintiff responds by observing that this “insufficient contacts” argument 
goes more to the question of California’s personal jurisdiction over defendant, an 
objection it concededly waived by accepting personal service and making a 
general appearance in the case.  (Code Civ. Proc., § 410.30, subd. (b); see, e.g., 
 
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People v. Ciancio (2003) 109 Cal.App.4th 175, 192-193; 2 Witkin, Cal. Procedure 
(4th ed. 1996) Jurisdiction, § 184, pp. 747-748, and cases cited.)  Indeed, the case 
on which defendant primarily relies in this regard, Star Aviation, Inc. v. Superior 
Court (1977) 73 Cal.App.3d 807, was a personal jurisdiction case arising from a 
nonresident corporation’s “motion to quash service of summons upon it for lack of 
jurisdiction over its person.”  (Id. at p. 810.)  The decision was confined to 
determining whether the defendant had sufficient presence or contacts in this state 
to justify requiring it to submit to jurisdiction here.   
Generally, subject matter jurisdiction is the court’s power to hear and resolve 
a particular dispute or cause of action, while personal jurisdiction relates to the 
power to bind a particular party, and depends on the party’s presence, contacts, or 
other conduct within the forum state.  (See Greener v. Workers’ Comp. Appeals 
Bd. (1993) 6 Cal.4th 1028, 1034-1035; 2 Witkin, Cal. Procedure, supra, 
Jurisdiction, §§ 10-11, pp. 555-556; id., §§ 110-111, pp. 648-651.)  The issue 
before us involves the subject matter jurisdiction of California state courts over 
Jones Act claims, not personal jurisdiction over this defendant.  In light of the state 
Constitution’s broad conferral of jurisdiction (Cal. Const., art. VI, § 10), we see no 
fundamental jurisdictional impediment to allowing plaintiff to bring his Jones Act 
claim in California courts.   
Defendant disclaims any intent to argue that California was an inconvenient 
forum under the facts.  Such an argument would relate more to venue than subject 
matter jurisdiction, and again would have been waived by failing to assert it at 
trial.  (See Code Civ. Proc., § 396b, subd. (a); People v. Simon (2001) 25 Cal.4th 
1082, 1096 [venue is not jurisdictional], 1102 [waiver rule in civil cases]; Cooney 
v. Cooney (1944) 25 Cal.2d 202, 207-208).   
 
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CONCLUSION 
The judgment of the Court of Appeal is affirmed.   
 
  
 
 
 
CHIN, J. 
 
 
 
 
WE CONCUR: 
 
GEORGE, C.J. 
KENNARD, J. 
BAXTER, J. 
WERDEGAR, J. 
BROWN, J. 
MORENO, J. 
 
 
 
See next page for addresses and telephone numbers for counsel who argued in Supreme Court. 
 
Name of Opinion Donaldson v. National Marine, Inc. 
__________________________________________________________________________________ 
 
Unpublished Opinion 
Original Appeal 
Original Proceeding 
Review Granted XXX 101 Cal.App.4th 552 
Rehearing Granted 
 
__________________________________________________________________________________ 
 
Opinion No. S110301 
Date Filed: March 14, 2005 
__________________________________________________________________________________ 
 
Court: Superior 
County: San Francisco 
Judge: James J. McBride 
 
__________________________________________________________________________________ 
 
Attorneys for Appellant: 
 
Rushford & Bonotto, Phillip R. Bonotto, Brian M. Taylor, John P. Carty III and Carla L. Johansen for 
Defendant and Appellant. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
__________________________________________________________________________________ 
 
Attorneys for Respondent: 
 
Wartnick, Chaber, Harowitz & Tigerman, The Wartnick Firm, Harry F. Wartnick, Martha A. H. Berman, 
Stephen M. Tigerman, Richard A. Brody; Law Offices of Daniel U. Smith and Daniel U. Smith for Plaintiff 
and Respondent. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Counsel who argued in Supreme Court (not intended for publication with opinion): 
 
Phillip R. Bonotto 
Rushford & Bonotto 
2277 Fair Oaks Blvd., Suite 495 
Sacramento, CA  95825 
(916) 565-0590 
 
Daniel U. Smith 
Law Offices of Daniel U. Smith 
Post Office Box 278 
Kentfield, CA  94914 
(415) 461-5630