A Test By Any Other Name: The Influence of Justice Breyer's Concurrence in Kiobel v. Royal Dutch Petroleum Co.
In Kiobel v. Royal Dutch Petroleum Co., the Supreme Court applied the presumption against extraterritorial application to the Alien Tort Statute (“ATS”). In doing so, the Court undermined the generally accepted view of the ATS: that it could apply to actions abroad. Applying this presumption severely limited the factual circumstances that could produce a viable ATS claim. The majority opinion carved an exception, permitting extraterritorial ATS claims that “touch and concern” the United States, but declined to set more specific guidelines. In the absence of such guidelines, lower courts have applied the presumption in an overbroad fashion, barring claims that the Court might have intended to fall within its exception. However, concurring in Kiobel, Justice Breyer offered an alternative three-pronged test to determine jurisdiction. Though Justice Breyer reached the same conclusion as the Court—that jurisdiction did not lie—his test is more specific than the majority’s and also provides lower courts with a proper means of assessing ATS extraterritoriality. This Note first extensively discusses the rich and colorful history of the ATS, tracking its outgrowth from the Articles of Confederation to its use in the eighteenth century to bring pirates to justice. It then discusses the modern line of ATS cases, including the various procedural elements that courts have read into the Statute. Turning to Kiobel, it examines the impact of the Court’s reversal of precedent by applying a presumption against extraterritorial application to the ATS, specifically focusing on the majority standard’s lack of clarity. This
The Alien Tort Statute: A Vehicle for Implementing the United Nations Guiding Principles for Business and Human Rights and Promoting Corporate Social Responsibility
IN 2005, PROFESSOR JOHN RUGGIE of the Harvard Kennedy School, an eminent authority on corporate citizenship and responsibility, received a United Nations (“U.N.”) mandate to propose measures aimed at strengthening the human rights performance of transnational corporations.1 His task was a difficult one. Global governance has historically been carried out through a Westphalian-type, state-centered system;2 however, the rapid growth of transnational corporations—largely spurred by globalization—has transformed the traditional state-dominated social order. This transformation highlights the need for an international framework that would guide and regulate the activities of transnational corporations.3 In the context of an emerging sentiment that human rights standards should be relevant among non-state actors,4 Ruggie embarked
Molecular diversity of skin mucus lectins in fish.
Among lectins in the skin mucus of fish, primary structures of four different types of lectin have been determined. Congerin from the conger eel Conger myriaster and AJL-1 from the Japanese eel Anguilla japonica were identified as galectin, characterized by its specific binding to beta-galactoside. Eel has additionally a unique lectin, AJL-2, which has a highly conserved sequence of C-type lectins but displays Ca(2+)-independent activity. This is rational because the lectin exerts its function on the cutaneous surface, which is exposed to a Ca(2+) scarce environment when the eel is in fresh water. The third type lectin is pufflectin, a mannose specific lectin in the skin mucus of pufferfish Takifugu rubripes. This lectin showed no sequence similarity with any known animal lectins but, surprisingly, shares sequence homology with mannose-binding lectins of monocotyledonous plants. The fourth lectin was found in the ponyfish Leiognathus nuchalis and exhibits homology with rhamnose-binding lectins known in eggs of some fish species. These lectins, except ponyfish lectin, showed agglutination of certain bacteria. In addition, pufflectin was found to bind to a parasitic trematode, Heterobothrium okamotoi. Taken together, these results demonstrate that skin mucus lectins in fish have wide molecular diversity.