Opinion ID: 1206013
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: considerations animating exhaustion

Text: Though it is self-evident, it is worth remembering that in ATS adjudication, the United States courts are not international tribunals. With this in mind, the appropriateness of applying prudential exhaustion to some ATS cases only gains force; if exhaustion is considered essential to the smooth operation of international tribunals whose jurisdiction is established only through explicit consent from other sovereigns, then it is all the more significant in the absence of such explicit consent to jurisdiction. Certain ATS cases, like this one, present United States courts with scenarios that simultaneously appeal to two divergent impulses that have traditionally played out in our country's international affairs and have been imported into our legal system. The first impulse is to safeguard and respect the principle of comity. See Societe Nationale Industrielle Aerospatiale v. United States Dist. Court for S. Dist. of Iowa, 482 U.S. 522, 544 n. 27, 107 S.Ct. 2542, 96 L.Ed.2d 461 (1987) (Comity refers to the spirit of cooperation in which a domestic tribunal approaches the resolution of cases touching the laws and interests of other sovereign states.). The second is the American role in establishing collective security arrangements that support international institutions, including international tribunals. See, e.g., Charter of the International Military Tribunal, art. 1, Aug. 8, 1945 (The United States, along with the Allied powers, collectively establishing the Tribunal for the just and prompt trial and punishment of major war criminals of the European Axis.). Both impulses draw from the recognition that we need a complement to our domestic system, because we are but one member in a community of nations. In that community, international law plays a substantive role. But international law also imposes limits. The lack of a significant United States nexus to the allegations here stimulates the comity impulse. These claims involve a foreign corporation's complicity in acts on foreign soil that affected aliens (though at least one of them  Sarei  has enjoyed the status of a lawful permanent resident of this country for some time now). This situation thus lacks the traditional bases for exercising our sovereign jurisdiction to prescribe laws, namely nationality, territory, and effects within the United States. See Restatement (Third) § 403(2) at cmt. d. (stating jurisdiction is appropriately exercised with respect to activity outside the state that has or intends to have substantial effect within the state's territory). The lack of a significant U.S. nexus is an important consideration in evaluating whether plaintiffs should be required to exhaust their local remedies in accordance with the principle of international comity. The nature of certain allegations and the gravity of the potential violations of international law also trigger the second impulse: our historical commitment to upholding customary international law. Some of the claims  torture, crimes against humanity, and war crimes  may implicate matters of universal concern, generally described as offenses for which a state has jurisdiction to punish without regard to territoriality or the nationality of the offenders. Kadic, 70 F.3d at 240 (citing Restatement (Third) § 404); see also Wiwa v. Royal Dutch Petroleum Co., 226 F.3d 88, 108 (2d Cir.2000) (holding the policy expressed in the TVPA favoring adjudication of claims of violations of international prohibitions on torture weighed against dismissing the action on forum non conveniens grounds). Nonetheless, simply because universal jurisdiction might be available, does not mean that we should exercise it. Indeed, the basis for exercising universal civil jurisdiction, such as under the ATS, is not as well-settled as the basis for universal criminal jurisdiction. See Sosa, 542 U.S. at 761-63, 124 S.Ct. 2739 (Breyer, J., concurring in part and in the judgment) (noting the lack of similar procedural consensus supporting the exercise of jurisdiction in ATS cases as obtained to piracy in the 18th century or the contemporary exercise of universal criminal jurisdiction over matters of universal concern). [9] Even the few courts that have exercised some form of universal criminal jurisdiction over matters of universal concern have done so cautiously. See Cedric Ryngaert, Applying the Rome Statute's Complementarity Principle: Drawing Lessons from the Prosecution of Core Crimes by States Acting under the Universality Principle, 19 Crim. L.F. 153, 155-73 (2006) (surveying decisions by Austria, Belgium, France, Germany, and Spain). This caution counsels that in ATS cases where the United States nexus is weak, courts should carefully consider the question of exhaustion, particularly  but not exclusively  with respect to claims that do not involve matters of universal concern. With these underlying principles in place, we suggest a framework for evaluating exhaustion.