SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES
GOODYEAR DUNLOP TIRES OPERATIONS, S. A., et al., PETITIONERS v. EDGAR D. BROWN,
et ux., co-administrators of the ESTATE
OF JULIAN DAVID BROWN, et al.
on writ of certiorari to the court of appeals of north carolina
[June 27, 2011]
Justice Ginsburg delivered the opinion of the Court.
This case concerns the jurisdiction of state
courts over corporations organized and operating abroad. We address, in
particular, this question: Are foreign subsidiaries of a United States
parent corporation amenable to suit in state court on claims unrelated
to any activity of the subsidiaries in the forum State?
A bus accident outside Paris that took the
lives of two 13-year-old boys from North Carolina gave rise to the
litigation we here consider. Attributing the accident to a defective
tire manufactured in Turkey at the plant of a foreign subsidiary of The
Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company (Goodyear USA), the boys’ parents
commenced an action for damages in a North Carolina state court; they
named as defendants Goodyear USA, an Ohio corporation, and three of its
subsidiaries, organized and operating, respectively, in Turkey, France,
and Luxembourg. Goodyear USA, which had plants in North Carolina and
regularly engaged in commercial activity there, did not contest the
North Carolina court’s jurisdiction over it; Goodyear USA’s foreign
subsidiaries, however, maintained that North Carolina lacked
adjudicatory authority over them.
A state court’s assertion of jurisdiction
exposes defendants to the State’s coercive power, and is therefore
subject to review for compatibility with the Fourteenth Amendment ’s
Due Process Clause. International Shoe Co. v. Washington , 326 U. S.
310, 316 (1945) (assertion of jurisdiction over out-of-state
corporation must comply with “ ‘traditional notions of fair play and
substantial justice’ ” (quoting Milliken v. Meyer , 311 U. S. 457, 463
(1940) )). Opinions in the wake of the pathmarking International Shoe
decision have differentiated between general or all-purpose
jurisdiction, and specific or case-linked jurisdiction. Helicopteros
Nacionales de Colombia, S. A. v. Hall , 466 U. S. 408 , nn. 8, 9 (1984).
A court may assert general jurisdiction over
foreign (sister-state or foreign-country) corporations to hear any and
all claims against them when their affiliations with the State are so
“continuous and systematic” as to render them essentially at home in
the forum State. See International Shoe , 326 U. S., at 317. Specific
jurisdiction, on the other hand, depends on an “affiliatio[n] between
the forum and the underlying controversy,” principally, activity or an
occurrence that takes place in the forum State and is therefore subject
to the State’s regulation. von Mehren & Trautman, Jurisdiction to
Adjudicate: A Suggested Analysis, 79 Harv. L. Rev. 1121, 1136 (1966)
(hereinafter von Mehren & Trautman); see Brilmayer et al., A
General Look at General Jurisdiction, 66 Texas L. Rev. 721, 782 (1988)
(hereinafter Brilmayer). In contrast to general, all-purpose
jurisdiction, specific jurisdiction is confined to adjudication of
“issues deriving from, or connected with, the very controversy that
establishes jurisdiction.” von Mehren & Trautman 1136.
Because the episode-in-suit, the bus accident,
occurred in France, and the tire alleged to have caused the accident
was manufactured and sold abroad, North Carolina courts lacked specific
jurisdiction to adjudicate the controversy. The North Carolina Court of
Appeals so acknowledged. Brown v. Meter , 199 N. C. App. 50, 57–58, 681
S. E. 2d 382, 388 (2009). Were the foreign subsidiaries nonetheless
amenable to general jurisdiction in North Carolina courts? Confusing or
blending general and specific jurisdictional inquiries, the North
Carolina courts answered yes. Some of the tires made abroad by
Goodyear’s foreign subsidiaries, the North Carolina Court of Appeals
stressed, had reached North Carolina through “the stream of commerce”;
that connection, the Court of Appeals believed, gave North Carolina
courts the handle needed for the exercise of general jurisdiction over
the foreign corporations. Id. , at 67–68, 681 S. E. 2d, at 394–395.
A connection so limited between the forum and
the for-eign corporation, we hold, is an inadequate basis for the
exercise of general jurisdiction. Such a connection does not establish
the “continuous and systematic” affiliation necessary to empower North
Carolina courts to entertain claims unrelated to the foreign
corporation’s contacts with the State.
I
On April 18, 2004, a bus destined for Charles
de Gaulle Airport overturned on a road outside Paris, France.
Passengers on the bus were young soccer players from North Carolina
beginning their journey home. Two 13-year-olds, Julian Brown and
Matthew Helms, sustained fatal injuries. The boys’ parents, respondents
in this Court, filed a suit for wrongful-death damages in the Superior
Court of Onslow County, North Carolina, in their capacity as
administrators of the boys’ estates. Attributing the accident to a tire
that failed when its plies separated, the parents alleged negligence in
the “design, construction, testing, and inspection” of the tire. 199 N.
C. App., at 51, 681 S. E. 2d, at 384 (internal quotation marks omitted).
Goodyear Luxembourg Tires, SA (Goodyear
Luxembourg), Goodyear Lastikleri T. A. S. (Goodyear Turkey), and
Goodyear Dunlop Tires France, SA (Goodyear France), petitioners here,
were named as defendants. Incorporated in Luxembourg, Turkey, and
France, respectively, petitioners are indirect subsidiaries of Goodyear
USA, an Ohio corporation also named as a defendant in the suit.
Petitioners manufacture tires primarily for sale in European and Asian
markets. Their tires differ in size and construction from tires
ordinarily sold in the United States. They are designed to carry
significantly heavier loads, and to serve under road conditions and
speed limits in the manufacturers’ primary markets. 1
In contrast to the parent company, Goodyear
USA, which does not contest the North Carolina courts’ personal
jurisdiction over it, petitioners are not registered to do business in
North Carolina. They have no place of business, employees, or bank
accounts in North Carolina. They do not design, manufacture, or
advertise their products in North Carolina. And they do not solicit
business in North Carolina or themselves sell or ship tires to North
Carolina customers. Even so, a small percentage of petitioners’ tires
(tens of thousands out of tens of millions manufactured between 2004
and 2007) were distributed within North Carolina by other Goodyear USA
affiliates. These tires were typically custom ordered to equip
specialized vehicles such as cement mixers, waste haulers, and boat and
horse trailers. Petitioners state, and respondents do not here deny,
that the type of tire involved in the accident, a Goodyear Regional RHS
tire manufactured by Goodyear Turkey, was never distributed in North
Carolina.
Petitioners moved to dismiss the claims
against them for want of personal jurisdiction. The trial court denied
the motion, and the North Carolina Court of Appeals af-firmed.
Acknowledging that the claims neither “related to, nor … ar[o]se from,
[petitioners’] contacts with North Carolina,” the Court of Appeals
confined its analysis to “general rather than specific jurisdiction,”
which the court recognized required a “higher threshold” showing: A
defendant must have “continuous and systematic contacts” with the
forum. Id. , at 58, 681 S. E. 2d, at 388 (internal quotation marks
omitted). That threshold was crossed, the court determined, when
petitioners placed their tires “in the stream of interstate commerce
without any limitation on the extent to which those tires could be sold
in North Carolina.” Id. , at 67, 681 S. E. 2d, at 394.
Nothing in the record, the court observed,
indicated that petitioners “took any affirmative action to cause tires
which they had manufactured to be shipped into North Carolina.” Id. ,
at 64, 681 S. E. 2d, at 392. The court found, however, that tires made
by petitioners reached North Carolina as a consequence of a
“highly-organized distribution process” involving other Goodyear USA
subsidiaries. Id. , at 67, 681 S. E. 2d, at 394. Petitioners, the court
noted, made “no attempt to keep these tires from reaching the North
Carolina market.” Id. , at 66, 681 S. E. 2d, at 393. Indeed, the very
tire involved in the accident, the court observed, conformed to tire
standards established by the U. S. Department of Transportation and
bore markings required for sale in the United States. Ibid . 2 As
further support, the court invoked North Carolina’s “interest in
providing a forum in which its citizens are able to seek redress for
[their] injuries,” and noted the hardship North Carolina plaintiffs
would experience “[were they] required to litigate their claims in
France,” a country to which they have no ties. Id. , at 68, 681 S. E.
2d, at 394. The North Carolina Supreme Court denied discretionary
review. Brown v. Meter, 364 N. C. 128, 695 S. E. 2d 756 (2010).
We granted certiorari to decide whether the
general jurisdiction the North Carolina courts asserted over
petitioners is consistent with the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth
Amendment . 561 U. S. ___ (2010).
II
A
The Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth
Amendment sets the outer boundaries of a state tribunal’s authority to
proceed against a defendant. Shaffer v. Heitner , 433 U. S. 186, 207
(1977) . The canonical opinion in this area remains International Shoe,
326 U. S. 310 , in which we held that a State may authorize its courts
to exercise personal jurisdiction over an out-of-state defendant if the
defendant has “certain minimum contacts with [the State] such that the
maintenance of the suit does not offend ‘traditional notions of fair
play and substantial justice.’ ” Id. , at 316 (quoting Meyer , 311 U.
S., at 463).
Endeavoring to give specific content to the
“fair play and substantial justice” concept, the Court in International
Shoe classified cases involving out-of-state corporate defendants.
First, as in International Shoe itself, jurisdiction unquestionably
could be asserted where the corporation’s in-state activity is
“continuous and systematic” and that activity gave rise to the
episode-in-suit . 326 U. S., at 317. Further, the Court observed, the
commission of certain “single or occasional acts” in a State may be
sufficient to render a corporation answerable in that State with
respect to those acts, though not with respect to matters unrelated to
the forum connections. Id. , at 318. The heading courts today use to
encompass these two International Shoe categories is “specific
jurisdiction.” See von Mehren & Trautman 1144–1163. Adjudicatory
authority is “specific” when the suit “aris[es] out of or relate[s] to
the defendant’s contacts with the forum.” Helicopteros , 466 U. S., at
414, n. 8.
International Shoe distinguished from cases that fit within the
“specific jurisdiction” categories, “instances in which the continuous
corporate operations within a state [are] so substantial and of such a
nature as to justify suit against it on causes of action arising from
dealings entirely distinct from those activities.” 326 U. S., at 318.
Adjudicatory authority so grounded is today called “general
jurisdiction.” Helicopteros , 466 U. S., at 414, n. 9. For an
individual, the paradigm forum for the exercise of general jurisdiction
is the individual’s domicile; for a corporation, it is an equivalent
place, one in which the corporation is fairly regarded as at home. See
Brilmayer 728 (identifying domicile, place of incorporation, and
principal place of business as “paradig[m]” bases for the exercise of
general jurisdiction).
Since International Shoe , this Court’s
decisions have elaborated primarily on circumstances that warrant the
exercise of specific jurisdiction, particularly in cases involving
“single or occasional acts” occurring or having their impact within the
forum State. As a rule in these cases, this Court has inquired whether
there was “some act by which the defendant purposefully avail[ed]
itself of the privilege of conducting activities within the forum
State, thus invoking the benefits and protections of its laws.” Hanson
v. Denckla , 357 U. S. 235, 253 (1958) . See, e.g. , World-Wide
Volkswagen Corp. v. Woodson , 444 U. S. 286, 287, 297 (1980) (Oklahoma
court may not exercise personal jurisdiction “over a nonresident
automobile retailer and its wholesale distributor in a
products-liability action, when the defendants’ only connection with
Oklahoma is the fact that an automobile sold in New York to New York
residents became involved in an accident in Oklahoma”); Burger King
Corp. v. Rudzewicz , 471 U. S. 462, 474–475 (1985) (franchisor
headquartered in Florida may maintain breach-of-contract action in
Florida against Michigan franchisees, where agreement contemplated
on-going interactions between franchisees and franchisor’s
headquarters); Asahi Metal Industry Co. v. Superior Court of Cal.,
Solano Cty. , 480 U. S. 102, 105 (1987) (Taiwanese tire manufacturer
settled product liability action brought in California and sought
indemnification there from Japanese valve assembly manufacturer;
Japanese company’s “mere awareness … that the components it
manufactured, sold, and delivered outside the United States would reach
the forum State in the stream of commerce” held insufficient to permit
California court’s adjudication of Taiwanese company’s
cross-complaint); id. , at 109 (opinion of O’Connor, J.); id. , at
116–117 (Brennan, J., concurring in part and concurring in judgment).
See also Twitchell, The Myth of General Jurisdiction, 101 Harv. L. Rev.
610, 628 (1988) (in the wake of International Shoe , “specific
jurisdiction has become the centerpiece of modern jurisdiction theory,
while general jurisdiction plays a reduced role”).
In only two decisions postdating International
Shoe , discussed infra , at 11–13, has this Court considered whether an
out-of-state corporate defendant’s in-state contacts were sufficiently
“continuous and systematic” to justify the exercise of general
jurisdiction over claims unrelated to those contacts: Perkins v.
Benguet Consol. Mining Co. , 342 U. S. 437 (1952) (general jurisdiction
appropriately exercised over Philippine corporation sued in Ohio, where
the company’s affairs were overseen during World War II); and
Helicopteros , 466 U. S. 408 (helicopter owned by Colombian corporation
crashed in Peru; survivors of U. S. citizens who died in the crash, the
Court held, could not maintain wrongful-death actions against the
Colombian corporation in Texas, for the corporation’s helicopter
purchases and purchase-linked activity in Texas were insufficient to
subject it to Texas court’s general jurisdiction).
B
To justify the exercise of general
jurisdiction over petitioners, the North Carolina courts relied on the
petitioners’ placement of their tires in the “stream of commerce.” See
supra , at 5. The stream-of-commerce metaphor has been invoked
frequently in lower court decisions permitting “jurisdiction in
products liability cases in which the product has traveled through an
extensive chain of distribution before reaching the ultimate consumer.”
18 W. Fletcher, Cyclopedia of the Law of Corporations §8640.40, p. 133
(rev. ed. 2007). Typically, in such cases, a nonresident defendant,
acting outside the forum, places in the stream of commerce a product
that ultimately causes harm inside the forum. See generally Dayton,
Personal Jurisdiction and the Stream of Commerce, 7 Rev. Litigation
239, 262–268 (1988) (discussing origins and evolution of the
stream-of-commerce doctrine).
Many States have enacted long-arm statutes
authorizing courts to exercise specific jurisdiction over manufacturers
when the events in suit, or some of them, occurred within the forum
state. For example, the “Local Injury; Foreign Act” subsection of North
Carolina’s long-arm statute authorizes North Carolina courts to
exercise personal jurisdiction in “any action claiming injury to person
or property within this State arising out of [the defendant’s] act or
omission outside this State,” if, “in addition[,] at or about the time
of the injury,” ”[p]roducts … manufactured by the defendant were used
or consumed, within this State in the ordinary course of trade.” N. C.
Gen. Stat. Ann. §1–75.4(4)(b) (Lexis 2009). 3 As the North Carolina
Court of Appeals recognized, this provision of the State’s long-arm
statute “does not apply to this case,” for both the act alleged to have
caused injury (the fabrication of the allegedly defective tire) and its
impact (the accident) occurred outside the forum. See 199 N. C. App.,
at 61, n. 6, 681 S. E. 2d, at 390, n. 6. 4
The North Carolina court’s stream-of-commerce
analysis elided the essential difference between case-specific and
all-purpose (general) jurisdiction. Flow of a manufacturer’s products
into the forum, we have explained, may bolster an affiliation germane
to specific jurisdiction. See, e.g. , World-Wide Volkswagen , 444 U.
S., at 297 (where “the sale of a product … is not simply an isolated
occurrence, but arises from the efforts of the manufacturer or
distributor to serve … the market for its product in [several] States,
it is not unreasonable to subject it to suit in one of those States if
its allegedly defective merchandise has there been the source of injury
to its owner or to others ” (em-phasis added)). But ties serving to
bolster the exercise of specific jurisdiction do not warrant a
determination that, based on those ties, the forum has general
jurisdiction over a defendant. See, e.g. , Stabilisierungsfonds Fur
Wein v. Kaiser Stuhl Wine Distributors Pty. Ltd. , 647 F. 2d 200, 203,
n. 5 (CADC 1981) (defendants’ marketing arrangements, although
“adequate to permit litigation of claims relating to [their]
introduction of … wine into the United States stream of commerce, …
would not be adequate to support general, ‘all purpose’ adjudicatory
authority”).
A corporation’s “continuous activity of some sorts within a state,”
International Shoe instructed, “is not enough to support the demand
that the corporation be amenable to suits unrelated to that activity.”
326 U. S., at 318. Our 1952 decision in Perkins v. Benguet Consol.
Mining Co . remains “[t]he textbook case of general jurisdiction
appropriately exercised over a foreign corporation that has not
consented to suit in the forum.” Donahue v. Far Eastern Air Transport
Corp. , 652 F. 2d 1032, 1037 (CADC 1981).
Sued in Ohio, the defendant in Perkins was a
Philippine mining corporation that had ceased activities in the
Philippines during World War II. To the extent that the company was
conducting any business during and immediately after the Japanese
occupation of the Philippines, it was doing so in Ohio: the
corporation’s president maintained his office there, kept the company
files in that office, and supervised from the Ohio office “the
necessarily limited wartime activities of the company.” Perkins , 342
U. S., at 447–448. Although the claim-in-suit did not arise in Ohio,
this Court ruled that it would not violate due process for Ohio to
adjudicate the controversy. Ibid. ; see Keeton v. Hustler Magazine,
Inc. , 465 U. S. 770, 779–780, n. 11 (1984) (Ohio’s exercise of general
jurisdiction was permissible in Perkins because “Ohio was the
corporation’s principal, if temporary, place of business”).
We next addressed the exercise of general
jurisdiction over an out-of-state corporation over three decades later,
in Helicopteros. In that case, survivors of United States citizens who
died in a helicopter crash in Peru instituted wrongful-death actions in
a Texas state court against the owner and operator of the helicopter, a
Colombian corporation. The Colombian corporation had no place of
business in Texas and was not licensed to do business there.
“Basically, [the company’s] contacts with Texas consisted of sending
its chief executive officer to Houston for a contract-negotiation
session; accepting into its New York bank account checks drawn on a
Houston bank; purchasing helicopters, equipment, and training services
from [a Texas enterprise] for substantial sums; and sending personnel
to [Texas] for training.” 466 U. S., at 416. These links to Texas, we
determined, did not “constitute the kind of continuous and systematic
general business contacts … found to exist in Perkins, ” and were
insufficient to support the exercise of jurisdiction over a claim that
neither “ar[o]se out of … no[r] related to” the defendant’s activities
in Texas. Id. , at 415–416 (internal quotation marks omitted).
Helicopteros concluded that “mere purchases
[made in the forum State], even if occurring at regular intervals, are
not enough to warrant a State’s assertion of [general] jurisdiction
over a nonresident corporation in a cause of action not related to
those purchase transactions.” Id. , at 418. We see no reason to
differentiate from the ties to Texas held insufficient in Helicopteros
, the sales of petitioners’ tires sporadically made in North Carolina
through intermediaries. Under the sprawling view of general
jurisdiction urged by respondents and embraced by the North Carolina
Court of Appeals, any substantial manufacturer or seller of goods would
be amenable to suit, on any claim for relief, wherever its products are
distributed. But cf. World-Wide Volkswagen , 444 U. S., at 296 (every
seller of chattels does not, by virtue of the sale, “appoint the
chattel his agent for service of process”).
Measured against Helicopteros and Perkins ,
North Caro-lina is not a forum in which it would be permissible to
subject petitioners to general jurisdiction. Unlike the defendant in
Perkins , whose sole wartime business activity was conducted in Ohio,
petitioners are in no sense at home in North Carolina. Their attenuated
connections to the State, see supra , at 4–5, fall far short of the
“the continuous and systematic general business contacts” necessary to
empower North Carolina to entertain suit against them on claims
unrelated to anything that connects them to the State. Helicopteros ,
466 U. S., at 416. 5
C
Respondents belatedly assert a “single
enterprise” theory, asking us to consolidate petitioners’ ties to North
Carolina with those of Goodyear USA and other Goodyear entities. See
Brief for Respondents 44–50. In effect, respondents would have us
pierce Goodyear corporate veils, at least for jurisdictional purposes.
See Brilmayer & Paisley, Personal Jurisdiction and Substantive
Legal Relations: Corporations, Conspiracies, and Agency, 74 Cal. L.
Rev. 1, 14, 29–30 (1986) (merging parent and subsidiary for
jurisdictional purposes requires an inquiry “comparable to the
corporate law question of piercing the corporate veil”). But see 199 N.
C. App., at 64, 681 S. E. 2d, at 392 (North Carolina Court of Appeals
understood that petitioners are “separate corporate entities … not
directly re-sponsible for the presence in North Carolina of tires that
they had manufactured”). Neither below nor in their brief in opposition
to the petition for certiorari did respondents urge disregard of
petitioners’ discrete status as subsidiaries and treatment of all
Goodyear entities as a “unitary business,” so that jurisdiction over
the parent would draw in the subsidiaries as well. 6 Brief for
Respondents 44. Respondents have therefore forfeited this contention,
and we do not address it. This Court’s Rule 15.2; Granite Rock Co. v.
Teamsters , 561 U. S. ___, ___ (2010) (slip op., at 16).
* * *
For the reasons stated, the judgment of the North Carolina Court of Appeals is
Reversed.
Notes
1 Respondents portray Goodyear USA’s structure as a reprehensible
effort to “outsource” all manufacturing, and correspondingly, tort
litigation, to foreign jurisdictions. See Brief for Respondents 51–53.
Yet Turkey, where the tire alleged to have caused the accident-in-suit
was made, is hardly a strange location for a facility that primarily
supplies markets in Europe and Asia.
2 Such markings do not necessarily show that any of the tires
were destined for sale in the United States. To facilitate trade, the
Solicitor General explained, the United States encourages other
countries to “treat compliance with [Department of Transportation]
standards, in-cluding through use of DOT markings, as evidence that the
products are safely manufactured.” Brief for United States as Amicus
Curiae 32.
3 Cf. D. C. Code §13–423(a)(4) (2001) (providing for specific
jurisdiction over defendant who “caus[es] tortious injury in the
[forum] by an act or omission outside the [forum]” when, in addition,
the defendant “derives substantial revenue from goods used or consumed
… in the [forum]”).
4 The court instead relied on N. C. Gen. Stat. Ann.
§1–75.4(1)(d), see 199 N. C. App., at 57, 681 S. E. 2d, at 388, which
provides for jurisdiction, “whether the claim arises within or without
[the] State,” when the defendant “[i]s engaged in substantial activity
within this State, whether such activity is wholly interstate,
intrastate, or otherwise.” This provision, the North Carolina Supreme
Court has held, was “in-tended to make available to the North Carolina
courts the full juris-dictional powers permissible under federal due
process.” Dillon v. Numismatic Funding Corp., 291 N. C. 674, 676, 231
S. E. 2d 629, 630 (1977).
5 As earlier noted, see supra, at 6, the North Carolina Court of
Appeals invoked the State’s “well-recognized interest in providing a
forum in which its citizens are able to seek redress for injuries that
they have sustained.” 199 N. C. App., at 68, 681 S. E. 2d, at 394. But
“[g]eneral jurisdiction to adjudicate has in [United States] practice
never been based on the plaintiff’s relationship to the forum. There is
nothing in [our] law comparable to … article 14 of the Civil Code of
France (1804) under which the French nationality of the plaintiff is a
sufficient ground for jurisdiction.” von Mehren & Trautman 1137;
see Clermont & Palmer, Exorbitant Jurisdiction, 58 Me. L. Rev. 474,
492–495 (2006) (French law permitting plaintiff-based jurisdiction is
rarely invokedin the absence of other supporting factors). When a
defendant’s act outside the forum causes injury in the forum, by
contrast, a plaintiff’s residence in the forum may strengthen the case
for the exercise of specific jurisdiction. See Calder v. Jones, 465 U.
S. 783, 788 (1984) ; von Mehren & Trautman 1167–1173.
6 In the brief they filed in the North Carolina Court of Appeals,
respondents stated that petitioners were part of an “integrated
world-wide efforts to design, manufacture, market and sell their tires
in the United States, including in North Carolina.” App. 485 (emphasis
added). See also Brief in Opposition 18. Read in context, that
assertion was offered in support of a narrower proposition: The
distribution of petitioners’ tires in North Carolina, respondents
maintained, demonstrated petitioners’ own “calculated and deliberate
efforts to take advantage of the North Carolina market.” App. 485. As
already explained, see supra, at 12–13, even regularly occurring sales
of a product in a State do not justify the exercise of jurisdiction
over a claim unrelated to those sales.