Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/17pdf/16-499_1a7d.pdf
Page Number: 91.0

34 

JESNER v. ARAB BANK, PLC 

SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting 

the RTLM made their widespread influence possible.14 

There can be, and sometimes is, a profit motive for these 
types  of  abuses.    Although  the  market  does  not  price  all 
externalities,  the  law  does.    We  recognize  as  much  when 
we permit a civil suit to proceed against a paint company 
that long knew its product contained lead yet continued to
sell it to families, or against an oil company that failed to 
undertake  the  requisite  safety  checks  on  a  pipeline  that
subsequently  burst.  There  is  no  reason  why  a  different 
approach should obtain in the human rights context.

Immunizing  corporations  that  violate  human  rights
from  liability  under  the  ATS  undermines  the  system  of
accountability  for  law-of-nations  violations  that  the  First 
Congress endeavored to impose.  It allows these entities to 
take advantage of the significant benefits of the corporate
form  and  enjoy  fundamental  rights,  see,  e.g.,  Citizens 
United  v.  Federal  Election  Comm’n,  558  U. S.  310  (2010); 
Burwell v. Hobby Lobby Stores, Inc., 573 U. S. ___ (2014), 
without  having  to  shoulder  attendant 
fundamental 
responsibilities. 

I respectfully dissent. 

—————— 

14 See,  e.g.,  Nahimana  v.  Prosecutor,  Case  No.  ICTR  99–52–A,  Ap­
peals Judgment ¶176 (Nov. 28, 2007) (upholding finding that the RTLM
Collines  broadcasts  “contributed  substantially  to  the  killing  of  Tutsi”);
G. Prunier, The Rwanda Crisis: History of a Genocide 224 (2d ed. 1999) 
(detailing  incitements  to  murder  broadcast  on  the  RTLM,  including: 
“ ‘The  graves  are  not  yet  full.    Who  is  going  to  do  the  good  work  and 
help  us  fill  them  completely’ ”);  Yanagizawa-Drott,  Propaganda  and
Conflict: Evidence From the Rwandan Genocide, 129 Q. J. Econ. 1947, 
1950 (2014) (analyzing village-level data from Rwanda to estimate that
the  RTLM’s  transmissions  caused  10 percent  of  the  total  participation
in the genocide).