Subject Matter Jurisdiction

Power of the court to hear the “subject matter”.

Federal courts are courts of limited jurisdiction. Thus a federal court is limited in the
types of cases or subject matter that it is authorized to hear.

Federal Question cases or diversity of citizenship cases. (generally)

• Federal Question (§ 1331)

The case must “arise under” a federal statute or US Constitution or Treaty.
The usual test for this is the “well pleaded complaint” rule

• Diversity of Citizenship (§ 1332)

Diversity of Citizenship
AND
Amount in Controversy

Diversity of Citizenship
Complete Diversity (across the v.)
• Citizens of different states
• Citizens of a state and an alien
• Citizens of different states where an alien is an additional party

Citizenship
For individuals: Where domiciled
To determine domicile:
Residency and intent to remain indefinitely (at time of
filing)
To determine intent look to:
Subjective factors(statement/s of defendant)
Objective factors
(political actions such as where pay taxes, registered to
vote, drivers license etc.)
where has insurance, temporary v. more permanent
housing, etc.

Corporations
Dual citizenship: 1. Where incorporated & 2. Where principal place of business.

To determine PPB there is now one test that a court may apply:
• “nerve center” test where the decisions are made for the corporation such as
headquarters or administrative center. - Hertz
 Alien that is permanent resident treated as if citizen of that state.
Legal representatives of estates/infants/incompetents treated as citizen of state for the
decedent/infant/incompetent

Amount in controversy
Must exceed $75,000
If allege, then sufficient unless to a legal certainty can not recover
If relief sought is an injunction 4 tests have been used to determine whether amount in
controversy has been satisfied:
• Value of injunction to the plaintiff
• Cost to the defendant to comply
• Cost or value to the party invoking federal jurisdiction (thus in removed cases
burden switches to defendant
• If any of these tests results in amount in controversy being satisfied

Aggregation of different claims to satisfy amount in controversy (very limited)

Exxon case. If one party meets amount in controversy, then other parties can satisfy amt
in controversy (must still have diversity) [This is from Supp Jur therefore claim must
arise from case or controversy.]

Supplemental jurisdiction (§ 1367)

Court must first have original jurisdiction over a claim.

For additional claims that federal court does not have original jurisdiction over:

• Must be from same “case or controversy” as the original jurisdiction claim.

Test for this is “from the common nucleus of operative facts”
Are the claims related such that plaintiff would be expected to try them in one judicial
proceeding? Will the trial of both claims involve the same core/key/operative facts? Does
claim arise from same transaction or occurrence or series of transactions or occurrences?

• “Pendant party” includes Supp Jur over an added party that claim arises from
same case or controversy.[Last sentence of §1367(a)]

• If the original jurisdiction claim is a diversity claim the court will not have
supplemental jurisdiction over claims by the PLAINTIFF against parties added
under FRCP 14, 19, 20 or 24 when such claims would be inconsistent with §
1332.

Supplemental jurisdiction is discretionary with the court.

The factors listed in § 1367(c) must be weighed by the court, if it first determines that
there is supplemental jurisdiction, to see if it will exercise its discretion to hear the claim
under supplemental jurisdiction.

§ 1367(d) may be used by the plaintiff to toll the SOL for 30 days when a case that is
within the court’s Supplemental jurisdiction is dismissed under this discretionary rule.
This will encourage the court to exercise its discretion to dismiss the supplemental claim
because it will know that the dismissal is not the “death knell” to the claim when the SOL
has run since the filing of the claim. This provision has been found to be Unconstitutional
when the defendant is a state/state agency unless that defendant consents.

Removal

There is no right to removal.

It is statutory.

The defendant may remove a claim from state court to federal court when the claim
could have been filed in the federal court originally.

The claim is removed to the federal district court for the district in which the state court
sits where the claim was filed

All defendants must join the effort to remove.

In diversity cases the defendants may not remove if any of the defendants is a citizen of
the State in which the action is removed.

Removal must be done timely: 30 days from service of the Complaint or if not originally
removable 30 days from service or other receipt that the claim has now become
removable except if the case is a diversity case and it is more than 1 year from when the
case was filed.

If the case was removed improperly the Plaintiff must move to remand within 30 days
after the filing of the removal. (Unless the case was not within the Federal Courts Subject
matter jurisdiction-this can be raised at any time after removal)

Venue 1391c
Transfer- change of venue
FNC