Despite their repeated efforts to provide guidance to lower courts, the Justices once again find themselves in a familiar position: attempting to clarify the constitutional limits on courts’ power to exercise personal jurisdiction over defendants. The Supreme Court’s docket has seen a steady stream of personal jurisdiction cases in recent years. But the lower courts just can’t seem to get it right. See Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. v. Superior Court, 137 S. Ct. 1773 (2017) (reversing 8-1 the California Supreme Court’s finding of specific jurisdiction); BNSF Railway Co. v. Tyrrell, 137 S. Ct. 1549 (2017) (reversing 8-1 the Montana Supreme Court’s finding of general jurisdiction; Walden v. Fiore, 134 S. Ct. 1115 (2014) (reversing 9-0 the Ninth Circuit’s finding of specific jurisdiction); Daimler AG v. Bauman, 134 S. Ct. 746 (2014) (reversing 9-0 the Ninth Circuit’s finding of general jurisdiction); Goodyear Dunlop Tires Operations, S.A. v. Brown, 564 U.S. 915 (2011) (reversing 9-0 a North Carolina court’s finding of general jurisdiction); J. McIntyre Machinery, Ltd. v. Nicastro, 564 U.S. 873 (2011) (plurality opinion) (reversing the New Jersey Supreme Court’s finding of specific personal jurisdiction). This time, the Court is considering the limits of specific personal jurisdiction in a pair of consolidated cases involving Ford Motor Company.
The Due Process Clause permits a court to exercise specific personal jurisdiction over an out-of-state defendant when the plaintiff’s claims “arise out of or relate to” the defendant’s forum activities. Burger King Corp. v. Rudzewicz, 471 U.S. 462, 472 (1985). (Specific jurisdiction is distinct from general jurisdiction, which allows courts “to hear any and all claims against [a defendant] when their affiliations with the State are so ‘continuous and systematic’ as to render them essentially at home in the forum State.” BNSF Ry., 137 S. Ct. at 1558.) In Ford Motor Co. v. Montana Eighth Judicial District Court and Ford Motor Co. v. Bandemer, the Supreme Court must decide whether those requirements are met when a defendant has contacts with the forum state, but those contacts did not cause the plaintiff’s claims. In both cases, plaintiffs sued Ford for alleged defects (tires and airbags) in cars that were manufactured and originally sold outside the forum states, but that allegedly led to in-state injuries. The Montana and Minnesota Supreme Courts held that Ford’s contacts were enough to establish personal jurisdiction over the car manufacturer even though those contacts did not lead directly to...
