Keeping Corporations in the Courts: A Framework for Addressing Jurisdiction over Corporate Defendants in Class Action Litigation

Abstract

In a series of recent cases, the Supreme Court has made it significantly more difficult for plaintiffs to seek legal redress against corporations by limiting the power of courts to exercise personal jurisdiction over corporate defendants. Beginning in 2011, the Supreme Court limited the inquiry around where a corporation might be subject to general, all-purpose jurisdiction for claims against it. Then, in 2017, in Bristol-Myers Squibb v. Superior Court of California (“BMS”), the Court constrained the ability of plaintiffs to join together to sue a corporation when those plaintiffs were harmed by the corporation in different states. Importantly, these decisions left open whether these jurisdictional constraints apply to class actions.

This Note argues that because of the important role that class actions play in corporate accountability, it is essential that these limitations not be extended to the class action form. In summary, if the Rule 23 class action certification criteria are met and if the court has jurisdiction over the defendant with respect to class representatives’ claims under current personal jurisdiction doctrine, then the court should impute jurisdiction over that defendant with respect to the claims of class members. Part II of the Note details the scope of the aforementioned string of cases and discusses the scholarly, judicial, and popular responses to the potential applicability of BMS to class actions. Part III identifies the problems with applying BMS to class actions, focusing on the importance of private enforcement in maintaining corporate accountability and the essential role that the class action form plays in that process. Finally, Part IV considers the legal, policy, and normative considerations associated with limiting the scope of BMS and proposes solutions for how to limit BMS in the class action context.