State of confusion: causes and contemporary implications

¶ … Confusion has passed legislation that will economically harm Tanya, thus she will bring suit in federal court challenging the constitutionality of the legislation. This paper will focus on the jurisdictional standing and constitutional issues regarding this suit.

What court will have jurisdiction over Tanya's suit?

The federal district court sitting in the state of Confusion will have jurisdiction over this case because the federal courts are courts of limited jurisdiction who can only hear a case if it has personal and subject matter jurisdiction. The federal court sitting the state of Confusion will have both personal and subject matter jurisdiction over the parties and the claim.

Subject matter jurisdiction can be based either on diversity or-federal question jurisdiction (Cornell, 2008). It appears that diversity jurisdiction is met, but that is a precarious basis for jurisdiction in case any impleader may destroy complete diversity. The better position is subject matter jurisdiction, which is met here because the complaint, pleaded properly, turns on a constitutional issue, that being whether the statute violates the dormant commerce clause of the Constitution.

The second reason is that under the 11th Amendment, the federal courts are prohibited from hearing claims against a state (states (The Constitution of the United States of America, Amendment 11). Thus, Tanya cannot sue the state of Confusion, but must sue an officer of the state who was involved in the passing of the statute. Because Tanya is suing an officer, she likely must sue in the State of Confusion instead of the state of Denial in order to meet the personal jurisdiction requirements. Personal jurisdiction exists when the forum has power over a particular defendant. A state can exercise personal jurisdiction over a defendant who is present in the forum state or where the defendant is domiciled in the forum state. The officer defendant is likely both domiciled in Confusion and is personally present for process in Confusion, therefore the court has personal jurisdiction over the officer. Although Tanya can argue that the federal court sitting in Denial also has personal jurisdiction based on the state's long arm statute, it is unclear whether the officer likely does not have sufficient minimum contact with the state of Denial to make personal jurisdiction reasonable

Is the Confusion statute constitutional? Discuss your legal reasoning.

The Confusion state is not constitutional because it violates the commerce clause of the United States Constitution and the Privileges and Immunities Clause of Article IV as applicable to the states through the 14th Amendment.

A.

The Commerce Clause

The commerce clause, under Article I § 8 of the U.S. Constitution, gives Congress the right to control commerce among the several states (The Constitution of the United States of America, Article I § 8). Although here, there are not any federal statutes in place regarding truck hitches, the Supreme Court has consistently held that the language of the Commerce Clause contains a further, negative command prohibiting certain state regulation even when Congress has failed to legislate on the subject. This is evident in Quill Corp v. North Dakota [504 U.S. 298 (1992)] in which the Supreme Court determined that a tax levied on Quill Corp. violated the dormant commerce clause even though the subject matter was not federally pre-empted.

It is important to note that the 10th Amendment does give to the states all powers not delegated to the federal government by the Constitution, but the dormant commerce clause (which is a court given name, not an actual enumerated element of the commerce clause) limits the powers given to the states under the 10th Amendment. In United States v. Lopez [515 U.S. 549 (1995)] the Supreme Court determined that state gun possession laws near school do not violate the dormant commerce clause because a state may regulate local aspects of interstate commerce as long as the local regulation does not conflict with, or is not pre-empted by, federal regulation and the regulation meets the following tests: (1) the regulation does not discriminate against out of state competition in order to benefit local economic interests, and (2) the incidental burden on interstate commerce does not outweigh the local benefits of the regulation.