Parallel litigation is a scenario in which different courts are hearing the same claim(s). The general rule is that parallel litigation (and the "race to judgment" that results) is a necessary and acceptable consequence of our system of dual sovereignty, in which both state and federal courts have personal jurisdiction over the parties. A major exception to this rule is that a second parallel In rem proceeding will be enjoined by the first court to obtain jurisdiction, as it has already been drawn into constructive possession of the object of the dispute.
A court is any person or institution with authority to judge or adjudicate, often as a government institution, with the authority to adjudicate legal disputes between parties and carry out the administration of justice in civil, criminal, and administrative matters in accordance with the rule of law. In both common law and civil law legal systems, courts are the central means for dispute resolution, and it is generally understood that all people have an ability to bring their claims before a court. Similarly, the rights of those accused of a crime include the right to present a defense before a court.
In rare cases the federal courts have announced a policy of not hearing (abstaining from) a case when there is parallel litigation going on in state courts, following the Colorado River abstention doctrine. In that case, the federal government sued for adjudication of certain water rights in Colorado; parties to a state court proceeding joined the U.S. as a defendant, and the Supreme Court said the federal courts should defer to that parallel litigation. This analysis can be conceptualized as a Forum non conveniens analysis in which there is already an alternative forum in play.
An abstention doctrine is any of several doctrines that a United States court may apply to refuse to hear a case if hearing the case would potentially intrude upon the powers of another court. Such doctrines are usually invoked where lawsuits involving the same issues are brought in two different court systems at the same time.
Colorado River Water Conservation District v. United States, 424 U.S. 800 (1976), was a case in which the Supreme Court of the United States created a new doctrine of abstention, to prevent duplicative litigation between state and federal courts.
Forum non conveniens (FNC) is a (mostly) common law legal doctrine whereby courts may refuse to take jurisdiction over matters where there is a more appropriate forum available to the parties. As a doctrine of the conflict of laws, forum non conveniens applies between courts in different countries and between courts in different jurisdictions in the same country. Forum non conveniens is not applicable between counties or federal districts within a state.
The general rule is that "[a]bstention from the exercise of federal jurisdiction is the exception, not the rule." Moses H. Cone Mem'l Hosp. v. Mercury Constr. Corp., 460 U.S. 1, 14 (1983) (citing Colo. River Water Conserv. Distr. v. United States, 424 U.S. 800, 813 (1976)).
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Personal jurisdiction is a court's jurisdiction over the parties to a lawsuit, as opposed to subject-matter jurisdiction, which is jurisdiction over the law and facts involved in the suit. If a court does not have personal jurisdiction over a party, its rulings or decrees cannot be enforced upon that party, except by comity; i.e., to the extent that the sovereign which has jurisdiction over the party allows the court to enforce them upon that party. A court that has personal jurisdiction has both the authority to rule on the law and facts of a suit and the power to enforce its decision upon a party to the suit. In some cases, territorial jurisdiction may also constrain a court's reach, such as preventing hearing of a case concerning events occurring on foreign territory between two citizens of the home jurisdiction.
In the United States, a state court has jurisdiction over disputes with some connection to a U.S. state. State courts handle the vast majority of civil and criminal cases in the United States; the much smaller in case load and personnel, United States federal courts, handle different types of cases.
In law, a settlement is a resolution between disputing parties about a legal case, reached either before or after court action begins. The term "settlement" also has other meanings in the context of law. Structured settlements provide for future periodic payments, instead of a one time cash payment.
Forum shopping is a colloquial term for the practice of litigants having their legal case heard in the court thought most likely to provide a favorable judgment. Some jurisdictions have, for example, become known as "plaintiff-friendly" and so have attracted litigation even when there is little or no connection between the legal issues and the jurisdiction in which they are to be litigated.
In the law of the United States, diversity jurisdiction is a form of subject-matter jurisdiction in civil procedure in which a United States district court in the federal judiciary has the power to hear a civil case when the amount in controversy exceeds $75,000 and where the persons that are parties are "diverse" in citizenship or state of incorporation, which generally indicates that they differ in state and/or nationality. Diversity jurisdiction and federal-question jurisdiction constitute the two primary categories of subject matter jurisdiction in U.S. federal courts.
The Erie doctrine is a fundamental legal doctrine of civil procedure in the United States which mandates that a federal court sitting in diversity jurisdiction must apply state substantive law to resolve claims under state law.
Judicial disqualification, also referred to as recusal, is the act of abstaining from participation in an official action such as a legal proceeding due to a conflict of interest of the presiding court official or administrative officer. Applicable statutes or canons of ethics may provide standards for recusal in a given proceeding or matter. Providing that the judge or presiding officer must be free from disabling conflicts of interest makes the fairness of the proceedings less likely to be questioned.
The Tucker Act is a federal statute of the United States by which the United States government has waived its sovereign immunity with respect to certain lawsuits.
The principle of lis alibi pendens applies both in municipal law, public international law, and private international law to address the problem of potentially contradictory judgments. If two courts were to hear the same dispute, it is possible they would reach inconsistent decisions. To avoid the problem, there are two rules.
Burford v. Sun Oil Co., 319 U.S. 315 (1943), was a United States Supreme Court case in which the Court created a new doctrine of abstention.
In law, intervention is a procedure to allow a nonparty, called intervenor to join ongoing litigation, either as a matter of right or at the discretion of the court, without the permission of the original litigants. The basic rationale for intervention is that a judgment in a particular case may affect the rights of nonparties, who ideally should have the right to be heard.
Supplemental jurisdiction is the authority of United States federal courts to hear additional claims substantially related to the original claim even though the court would lack the subject-matter jurisdiction to hear the additional claims independently. 28 U.S.C. § 1367 is a codification of the Supreme Court's rulings on ancillary jurisdiction and pendent jurisdiction and a superseding of the Court's treatment of pendent party jurisdiction.
Kansas v. Colorado is a longstanding litigation before the Supreme Court of the United States between two states of the United States, Kansas and Colorado. The Court has rendered numerous opinions in this case:
International litigation, sometimes called transnational litigation, is the practice of litigation in connection with disputes among businesses or individuals residing or based in different countries.
In the law of the United States, a certified question is a formal request by one court from another court, usually but not always in another jurisdiction, for an opinion on a question of law.
Moses H. Cone Memorial Hospital v. Mercury Construction Corp., 460 U.S. 1 (1983), commonly cited as Moses Cone or Cone Hospital, is a United States Supreme Court decision concerning civil procedure, specifically the abstention doctrine, as it applies to enforcing an arbitration clause in a diversity case. By a 6–3 margin, the justices resolved a complicated construction dispute by ruling that a North Carolina hospital had to arbitrate a claim against the Alabama-based company it had hired to build a new wing, even though it meant that it could not consolidate it with ongoing litigation it had brought in state court against the contractor and architect.
The original jurisdiction of the Supreme Court of the United States is limited to a small class of cases described in Article III, section 2, of the United States Constitution, and further delineated by statute.
