Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/17pdf/16-499_1a7d.pdf
Page Number: 73

16 

JESNER v. ARAB BANK, PLC 

SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting 

gress  authorized  the  federal  courts  to  “recognize  private 
causes of action for certain torts in violation of the law of 
nations,” 542 U. S., at 724, so long as the underlying norm
had  no  “less  definite  content  and  acceptance  among  civi­
lized nations than the historical paradigms familiar when 
§1350 was enacted,” id., at 732.  That holding was no mere 
“suggestion,”  ante,  at  2  (opinion  of  GORSUCH,  J.),  as  this 
Court has made clear.  See Kiobel, 569 U. S., at 116–117. 
Given that the First Congress authorized suit for viola­
tions  based  on  “the  law  of  nations”  and  “treat[ies]  of  the 
United States,” 28 U. S. C. §1350, it is natural to conclude 
that Congress intended the district courts to consider new 
claims  under  the  law  of  nations  as  that  law  and  our  Na­
tion’s treaty obligations continued to develop.  If Congress
intended  to  limit  such  cases  to  violations  of  safe  conduct, 
assaults  against  ambassadors,  piracy,  and—as  JUSTICE 
GORSUCH  suggests  may  have  been  the  case—“ ‘personal 
injuries that US citizens inflicted upon aliens resulting in 
less than $500 in damages,’ ” ante, at 10 (quoting Bellia &
Clark, The Alien Tort Statute and the Law of Nations, 78 
U. Chi. L.  Rev. 445, 509 (2011)),  it easily could have said 
so.  Instead, it granted the federal courts jurisdiction over
claims  based  on  “the  law  of  nations,”  a  body  of  law  that
Congress  did  not  understand  to  be  static.  See  United 
States  v.  The  La  Jeune  Eugenie,  26  F. Cas.  832,  846  (No. 
15,551) (CC Mass. 1822) (Story, J.) (“What, therefore, the 
law  of  nations  is  . . .  may  be  considered  as  modified  by
practice, or ascertained by the treaties of nations at differ­
ent periods.  It does not follow . . . that because a principle 
cannot  be  found  settled  by  the  consent  or  practice  of  na­
tions  at  one  time,  it  is  to  be  concluded,  that  at  no  subse­
quent  period  the  principle  can  be  considered  as  incorpo­
rated into the public code of nations”). 

The  question  for  courts  considering  new  ATS  claims  is, 
“Who  are  today’s  pirates?”    Kiobel,  569  U. S.,  at  129 
(BREYER, J., concurring in judgment).  Torturers and those