ARB.

In 1953 the Textile Workers Union of America entered into a collective bargaining agreement with Lincoln Mills of Alabama. The agreement was to run for one year and from year to year thereafter unless terminated on specified notices. It contained a no-strike clause and established a multi-step grievance procedure whose final step, available to either party, was arbitration. Several grievances concerning work loads and work assignments arose under the agreement. The union processed the grievances through every step of the contractual procedure, after which the employer denied them. The union then requested arbitration, but the employer refused. The union filed suit in federal district court seeking an order compelling the employer to arbitrate the grievances. The district court held that it possessed jurisdiction and directed the employer to comply with the arbitration provisions of the agreement. On appeal the Court of Appeals reversed by a divided vote, concluding that the district court lacked authority under either federal or state law to grant the requested relief. The Supreme Court granted certiorari. After the Court of Appeals decision but before oral argument, Lincoln Mills terminated its operations, ceased all work at the mill in March 1957, and contracted to sell its mill properties. Some of the grievances sought back pay for increased workloads, and the collective bargaining agreement authorized the arbitration board to adjust compensation retroactively.

Carnival Cruise Lines, Inc., a Florida corporation, sold passage tickets for a seven-day cruise aboard its ship the Tropicale to Eulala and Russel Shute, who resided in Washington. The Shutes purchased the tickets through a travel agent in Arlington, Washington. The agent forwarded the payment to Carnival's headquarters in Miami, Florida. Carnival then prepared the tickets and mailed them to the Shutes in Washington. The face of each ticket directed passengers to read the terms and conditions on the last pages. Contract page 1 stated that acceptance of the ticket constituted agreement to all terms and conditions. This included a provision that all disputes arising under or in connection with the contract would be litigated, if at all, in a court located in the State of Florida to the exclusion of the courts of any other state or country. The Shutes boarded the Tropicale in Los Angeles, California. The ship sailed to Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, and then returned to Los Angeles. While the vessel was in international waters off the Mexican coast, Eulala Shute slipped on a deck mat during a guided tour of the ship's galley and was injured. The Shutes filed a negligence suit against Carnival in the United States District Court for the Western District of Washington. Carnival moved for summary judgment. It contended that the forum-selection clause required the suit to be brought in Florida or, alternatively, that the district court lacked personal jurisdiction because Carnival's contacts with Washington were insubstantial. The district court granted the motion on personal jurisdiction grounds. The Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit reversed. It first concluded that Carnival's solicitation of business in Washington established sufficient contacts for personal jurisdiction. It then held that the forum-selection clause was unenforceable because it was not freely bargained for and because the Shutes were physically and financially incapable of litigating in Florida. The Supreme Court granted certiorari.

In 1999, the California legislature enacted the Holocaust Victim Insurance Relief Act (HVIRA). It requires any insurer doing business in the state to disclose details of all life, property, liability, health, annuities, dowry, educational, or casualty insurance policies sold in Europe between 1920 and 1945 by the insurer itself or any related company. This includes any parent, subsidiary, reinsurer, successor in interest, managing general agent, or affiliate. The required disclosures include the current status of each policy, the city of origin or domicile of each policyholder, and the names of the beneficiaries. All information is placed in a central public registry. Noncompliance triggers mandatory suspension of the company's license to do business in California. There are also misdemeanor sanctions for falsehood in required representations about whether and to whom the proceeds of each policy have been distributed. The Act arose against the backdrop of Nazi-era confiscations of Jewish insurance policies and decades of post-war diplomacy. After World War II, the United States participated in the Potsdam and Yalta Conferences and the 1946 Paris Agreement on reparations. The western Allies decided in the London Debt Agreement to put off consideration of claims arising out of the second World War until the final settlement of the problem of reparation. Following German reunification, class-action lawsuits flooded U.S. courts against companies that did business in Germany during the Nazi era. This prompted the federal government to negotiate a resolution. In July 2000, the United States and Germany signed the German Foundation Agreement. Germany established a foundation funded with 10 billion deutsch marks contributed equally by the government and German companies to compensate victims of the National Socialist era. The United States agreed to file statements in U.S. courts that the foundation should be the exclusive remedy for claims against German companies. It also agreed to use its best efforts to encourage state and local governments to respect the foundation as the exclusive mechanism. Parallel agreements were reached with Austria and France. The pacts endorsed the International Commission on Holocaust Era Insurance Claims (ICHEIC) for voluntary handling of insurance claims. This included relaxed standards of proof and procedures for policy information. After HVIRA took effect, administrative subpoenas were issued against subsidiaries of European insurers participating in the ICHEIC. Deputy Secretary of the Treasury Stuart Eizenstat wrote letters to California officials. He stated that the statute damaged the cooperative spirit required for the ICHEIC. He noted that it threatened to derail the German Foundation Agreement by denying companies the legal peace they sought. Several American and European insurance companies and the American Insurance Association then sued California Insurance Commissioner John Garamendi in federal district court. The district court issued a preliminary injunction and later granted summary judgment on due process grounds. The Ninth Circuit rejected the foreign affairs challenge. The Supreme Court granted certiorari in 2003.