Federal Courts. Review by Court of Appeals. When District Court Rejects Commission's Findings, Appellate Court Reverses Only If Rejection Was Clearly Erroneous. United States v. Twin City Power Co. (5th Cir. 1958)

1959 ◽  
Vol 72 (3) ◽  
pp. 565
1984 ◽  
Vol 78 (4) ◽  
pp. 783-810 ◽  
Author(s):  
Karl M. Meessen

When, on October 24, 1983, the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California handed down its decision in Timberlane Lumber Co. v. Bank of America and denied U.S. jurisdiction out of regard for the Honduran “system of justice,” there may have been some surprise that the case was still pending. The Timberlane decision of 1976 of the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, which remanded the matter to the district court, had already become a classic, even though it was preceded by the 1968 decision in United States v. First National City Bank on the production of documents located abroad. The Timberlane approach outlined by Judge Choy, under which the exercise of antitrust jurisdiction has to be restrained by a case-by-case analysis of various factors, was widely discussed (and usually praised) in legal writing, and was also followed by federal courts of the Second, Third, Fifth, Ninth and Tenth Circuits.


1999 ◽  
Vol 27 (2) ◽  
pp. 205-205
Author(s):  
choeffel Amy

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia upheld, in Presbyterian Medical Center of the University of Pennsylvania Health System v. Shalala, 170 F.3d 1146 (D.C. Cir. 1999), a federal district court ruling granting summary judgment to the Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) in a case in which Presbyterian Medical Center (PMC) challenged Medicare's requirement of contemporaneous documentation of $828,000 in graduate medical education (GME) expenses prior to increasing reimbursement amounts. DHHS Secretary Donna Shalala denied PMC's request for reimbursement for increased GME costs. The appellants then brought suit in federal court challenging the legality of an interpretative rule that requires requested increases in reimbursement to be supported by contemporaneous documentation. PMC also alleged that an error was made in the administrative proceedings to prejudice its claims because Aetna, the hospital's fiscal intermediary, failed to provide the hospital with a written report explaining why it was denied the GME reimbursement.


1989 ◽  
Vol 83 (3) ◽  
pp. 573-580 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert J. Dilworth

In these three breach-of-contract actions, United States federal courts considered the liability of home offices of U.S. banks for obligations of their foreign branches in the event of foreign governmental expropriation or exchange control measures. In each decision the court of appeals did not apply the act of state doctrine and gave no effect to the foreign governmental action, largely on the ground either that the situs of the debt was not within the exclusive jurisdiction of the foreign state carrying out the governmental measure at issue or that the law governing the obligation was not that of the foreign state.


1988 ◽  
Vol 82 (4) ◽  
pp. 828-830
Author(s):  
Edward M. Leigh

Plaintiff Zedan, an American citizen, brought suit in the United States District Court for the District of Columbia against the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia for breach of a contract guaranteeing wages and profits. While performance under the contract occurred in Saudi Arabia, plaintiff alleged that the jurisdictional requirements under the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act of 1976 (28 U.S.C. §§1330, 1602-1611 (1982)) (FSIA) were satisfied by a recruitment call in California from a representative of the royal overseer of a private Saudi company. The district court granted the Saudi motion to dismiss. On appeal, the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit (per Silberman, J.) unanimously affirmed and held: (1) that the telephone call did not have the requisite substantiality of contact with the United States; (2) that it was not sufficient to form the basis of a cause of action; and (3) that the alleged breach did not have sufficient direct effect in the United States to satisfy the exceptions to immunity under the FSIA.


1989 ◽  
Vol 83 (4) ◽  
pp. 918-923
Author(s):  
Daniel M. Price

In response to a request by Canadian tax authorities under the United States-Canada Double Taxation Convention (Convention), the U.S. Internal Revenue Service (IRS) issued summonses to obtain U.S. bank records concerning certain accounts of respondents, Canadian citizens whose Canadian tax liability was under investigation. Respondents sought to quash the summonses, arguing that because under 26 U.S.C. §7609(b) the IRS is prohibited by U.S. law from using its summons authority to obtain information about a U.S. taxpayer once a case is referred to the Justice Department for prosecution, and because the tax investigation of respondents was part of a Canadian criminal investigation, the IRS should be precluded from using its summons authority to honor the Canadian request under the Convention. Unsuccessful in the district court, respondents prevailed in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, which held that under the “good faith” standard applicable to enforcement of domestic summonses, the IRS may issue a summons pursuant to a Convention request only if it first determines and makes an affirmative statement to the effect that the Canadian investigation has not reached a stage analogous to a Justice Department referral by the IRS. The U.S. Supreme Court (per Brennan, J.) reversed, and held: (1) that if the summons is issued in good faith, it is enforceable regardless of whether the Canadian request is directed toward criminal prosecution under Canadian law; and (2) neither United States law nor anything in the text or the ratification history of the Convention supports the imposition of additional requirements. Justice Kennedy (joined by O’Connor, J.), concurring in part and in the judgment, filed a brief opinion to state his view that it is unnecessary to decide whether Senate preratification materials are authoritative sources for treaty interpretation. Justice Scalia, concurring in the judgment, wrote separately to oppose the use of such materials in treaty construction.


1989 ◽  
Vol 83 (3) ◽  
pp. 565-568
Author(s):  
Carlos M. Vázquez

Plaintiffs and respondents, Amerada Hess Shipping Corp. and United Carriers, Inc., were respectively the charterer and owner of the Hercules, a crude oil tanker that was bombed in international waters by Argentine military aircraft during the war over the Malvinas or Falkland Islands. The ship was severely damaged and had to be scuttled off the coast of Brazil. After unsuccessfully seeking relief in Argentina, the companies filed suit against defendant and appellant, the Argentine Republic, in the Southern District of New York. Plaintiffs argued that the federal courts had jurisdiction under the Alien Tort Statute (28 U.S.C. §1350 (1982)), which confers federal jurisdiction over “any civil action by an alien for a tort only, committed in violation of the law of nations or a treaty of the United States.” The district court dismissed the suit for lack of subject matter jurisdiction, holding that the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act of 1976 (28 U.S.C. §§1330, 1602-1611 (1982)) (FSIA) is by its terms the sole basis of federal jurisdiction over cases against foreign states. A divided panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit reversed. The Supreme Court (per Rehnquist, C.J.) unanimously reversed the Second Circuit and held that the FSIA provides the exclusive basis of federal jurisdiction over suits against foreign states.


1989 ◽  
Vol 83 (1) ◽  
pp. 90-94
Author(s):  
Sonya D. Winner

In 1985 two intelligence agencies of the South Korean Government announced that they had successfully disrupted a North Korean spy ring operating in the United States. Their press release, which was widely publicized in the Korean press, named Chang-Sin Lee as a North Korean agent associated with a spy ring at Western Illinois University, where Lee had been a student. The story was picked up and reported in the United States by six Korean-American newspapers and a public television station. When Lee sued for libel, the defendants relied upon the official report privilege, which gives absolute protection to the accurate republication of official government reports. The district court, holding that the privilege applied and that Lee had not overcome it by showing malice, dismissed the case. Plaintiff appealed to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, which in a two to one decision reversed (per Ervin, J.) and held: that the official report privilege does not apply to the republication of official reports of foreign governments. Judge Kaufman, sitting by designation, dissented from the majority’s reversal of the district court’s grant of summary judgment.


2007 ◽  
Vol 69 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Julie Vanneman

Basil Chapman retired from ACF Industries, a railroad-car maker, after thirty-eight years of service. In December 2003, he received an unexpected phone call at his West Virginia home from a union representative, who informed him that an ACF executive wanted to speak with him. When they spoke, the executive informed Mr. Chapman that ACF was planning on changing its retirees’ health coverage plan. The ACF plan would now have a lifetime maximum benefit cap on hospital and surgical expenses for each participant and would require retirees to make monthly contributions. According to court papers filed later, Mr. Chapman responded, “We have a contract. You can’t do that.” Then, he said that he would “file in federal court” against ACF. The next business day, ACF filed a declaratory judgment action in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri asking the court to rule that retiree benefits were not vested and that ACF accordingly could alter benefits unilaterally. On January 26, 2004, Mr. Chapman, other named plaintiffs, and their union sued ACF in the United States District Court for the Southern District of West Virginia.


2006 ◽  
Vol 34 (2) ◽  
pp. 467-469
Author(s):  
Ashley Clare Hague

The United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit recently upheld a United States District Court for the District of Maine Judge's decision to dismiss a Maine plaintiff's medical malpractice claim against a Massachusetts hospital defendant for want of personal jurisdiction over the hospital. The Court of Appeals found it unreasonable to hale hospitals into an out-of-state court merely because they accept out-of-state patients.Plaintiff Danielle Harlow is a Maine resident who suffered a stroke at the age of six while undergoing a medical procedure at Children's Hospital of Boston, Massachusetts (“Children's Hospital”). The stroke, allegedly caused by the Hospital's negligence, led to brain damage resulting in partial paralysis and cognitive and behavioral impairments. The procedure was supposed to treat Harlow's rapid heartbeat, a condition related to her Wolff-Parkinson-White Syndrome. Harlow's pediatrician in Maine recommended that she visit Children's Hospital in Boston to treat her arrhythmia.


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