Ford Motor Co. v. Montana Eighth Judicial District Court

NOTICE: This opinion is subject to
formal revision before publication in the preliminary print of the
United States Reports. Readers are requested to notify the Reporter
of Decisions, Supreme Court of the United States, Washington,
D. C. 20543, of any typographical or other formal errors, in
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															SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES

															_________________

															Nos. 19–368 and 19–369

															_________________

															FORD MOTOR COMPANY, PETITIONER

															19–368 v. MONTANA EIGHTH JUDICIAL DISTRICT COURT,
et al.

															on writ of certiorari to the supreme court of
montana

															FORD MOTOR COMPANY, PETITIONER

															19–369 v. ADAM BANDEMER

															on writ of certiorari to the supreme court of
minnesota

															[March 25, 2021]

															Justice Kagan delivered the opinion of the
Court.

															In each of these two cases, a state court held
that it had jurisdiction over Ford Motor Company in a products-
liability suit stemming from a car accident. The accident happened
in the State where suit was brought. The victim was one of the
State’s residents. And Ford did substantial business in the
State—among other things, advertising, selling, and servicing the
model of vehicle the suit claims is defective. Still, Ford contends
that jurisdiction is improper because the particular car involved
in the crash was not first sold in the forum State, nor was it
designed or manufactured there. We reject that argument. When a
company like Ford serves a market for a product in a State and that
product causes injury in the State to one of its residents, the
State’s courts may entertain the resulting suit.

															I

															Ford is a global auto company. It is
incorporated in Delaware and headquartered in Michigan. But its
business is everywhere. Ford markets, sells, and services its
products across the United States and overseas. In this country
alone, the company annually distributes over 2.5 million new cars,
trucks, and SUVs to over 3,200 licensed dealerships. See App. 70,
100. Ford also encourages a resale market for its products: Almost
all its dealerships buy and sell used Fords, as well as selling new
ones. To enhance its brand and increase its sales, Ford engages in
wide-ranging promotional activities, including television, print,
online, and direct-mail advertisements. No matter where you live,
you’ve seen them: “Have you driven a Ford lately?” or “Built Ford
Tough.” Ford also ensures that consumers can keep their vehicles
running long past the date of sale. The company provides original
parts to auto supply stores and repair shops across the country.
(Goes another slogan: “Keep your Ford a Ford.”) And Ford’s own
network of dealers offers an array of maintenance and repair
services, thus fostering an ongoing relationship between Ford and
its customers.

															Accidents involving two of Ford’s vehicles—a
1996 Explorer and a 1994 Crown Victoria—are at the heart of the
suits before us. One case comes from Montana. Markkaya Gullett was
driving her Explorer near her home in the State when the tread
separated from a rear tire. The vehicle spun out, rolled into a
ditch, and came to rest upside down. Gullett died at the scene of
the crash. The representative of her estate sued Ford in Montana
state court, bringing claims for a design defect, failure to warn,
and negligence. The second case comes from Minnesota. Adam Bandemer
was a passenger in his friend’s Crown Victoria, traveling on a
rural road in the State to a favorite ice-fishing spot. When his
friend rear-ended a snowplow, this car too landed in a ditch.
Bandemer’s air bag failed to deploy, and he suffered serious brain
damage. He sued Ford in Minnesota state court, asserting
products-liability, negligence, and breach-of-warranty claims.

															Ford moved to dismiss the two suits for lack of
personal jurisdiction, on basically identical grounds. According to
Ford, the state court (whether in Montana or Minnesota) had
jurisdiction only if the company’s conduct in the State had given
rise to the plaintiff ’s claims. And that causal link existed,
Ford continued, only if the company had designed, manufactured,
or—most likely—sold in the State the particular vehicle involved in
the accident.[ 1 ] In neither
suit could the plaintiff make that showing. Ford had designed the
Explorer and Crown Victoria in Michigan, and it had manufactured
the cars in (respectively) Kentucky and Canada. Still more, the
company had originally sold the cars at issue outside the forum
States—the Explorer in Washington, the Crown Victoria in North
Dakota. Only later resales and relocations by consumers had brought
the vehicles to Montana and Minnesota. That meant, in Ford’s view,
that the courts of those States could not decide the suits.

															Both the Montana and the Minnesota Supreme
Courts (affirming lower court decisions) rejected Ford’s argument.
The Montana court began by detailing the varied ways Ford
“purposefully” seeks to “serve the market in Montana.” 395 Mont.
478, 488, 443 P.3d 407, 414 (2019). The company advertises in the
State; “has thirty-six dealerships” there; “sells automobiles,
specifically Ford Explorers[,] and parts” to Montana residents; and
provides them with “certified repair, replacement, and recall
services.” Ibid . Next, the court assessed the relationship
between those activities and the Gullett suit. Ford’s conduct, said
the court, encourages “Montana residents to drive Ford vehicles.” Id., at 491, 443 P. 3d, at 416. When that driving
causes in-state injury, the ensuing claims have enough of a tie to
Ford’s Montana activities to support jurisdiction. Whether Ford
“designed, manufactured, or sold [the] vehicle” in the State, the
court concluded, is “immaterial.” Ibid. Minnesota’s Supreme
Court agreed. It highlighted how Ford’s “marketing and
advertisements” influenced state residents to “purchase and drive
more Ford vehicles.” 931 N.W.2d 744, 754 (2019). Indeed, Ford had
sold in Minnesota “more than 2,000 1994 Crown Victoria[s]”—the
“very type of car” involved in Bandemer’s suit. Id., at 751,
754. That the “ particular vehicle ” injuring him was
“designed, manufactured, [and first] sold” elsewhere made no
difference. Id., at 753 (emphasis in original). In the
court’s view, Ford’s Minnesota activities still had the needed
connection to Bandemer’s allegations that a defective Crown
Victoria caused in-state injury. See id., at 754.

															We granted certiorari to consider if Ford is
subject to jurisdiction in these cases. 589 U. S. ___ (2020).
We hold that it is.

															II

															A

															The Fourteenth Amendment’s Due Process Clause
limits a state court’s power to exercise jurisdiction over a
defendant. The canonical decision in this area remains International Shoe Co. v. Washington , 326 U.S.
310 (1945). There, the Court held that a tribunal’s authority
depends on the defendant’s having such “contacts” with the forum
State that “the maintenance of the suit” is “reasonable, in the
context of our federal system of government,” and “does not offend
traditional notions of fair play and substantial justice.” Id. , at 316–317 (internal quotation marks omitted). In
giving content to that formulation, the Court has long focused on
the nature and extent of “the defendant’s relationship to the forum
State.” Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. v. Superior Court of
Cal., San Francisco Cty. , 582 U. S. ___, ___ (2017) (slip
op., at 5) (citing cases). That focus led to our recognizing two
kinds of personal jurisdiction: general (sometimes called
all-purpose) jurisdiction and specific (sometimes called
case-linked) jurisdiction. See Goodyear Dunlop Tires Operations,
S. A. v. Brown , 564 U.S.
915 , 919 (2011).

															A state court may exercise general jurisdiction
only when a defendant is “essentially at home” in the State. Ibid. General jurisdiction, as its name implies, extends to
“any and all claims” brought against a defendant. Ibid. Those claims need not relate to the forum State or the defendant’s
activity there; they may concern events and conduct anywhere in the
world. But that breadth imposes a correlative limit: Only a select
“set of affiliations with a forum” will expose a defendant to such
sweeping jurisdiction. Daimler AG v. Bauman , 571 U.S.
117 , 137 (2014). In what we have called the “paradigm” case, an
individual is subject to general jurisdiction in her place of
domicile. Ibid . (internal quotation marks omitted). And the
“equivalent” forums for a corporation are its place of
incorporation and principal place of business. Ibid. (internal quotation marks omitted); see id. , at 139,
n. 19 (leaving open “the possibility that in an exceptional
case” a corporation might also be “at home” elsewhere). So general
jurisdiction over Ford (as all parties agree) attaches in Delaware
and Michigan—not in Montana and Minnesota. See supra, at
2.

															Specific jurisdiction is different: It covers
defendants less intimately connected with a State, but only as to a
narrower class of claims. The contacts needed for this kind of
jurisdiction often go by the name “purposeful availment.” Burger
King Corp. v. Rudzewicz , 471 U.S.
462 , 475 (1985). The defendant, we have said, must take “some
act by which [it] purposefully avails itself of the privilege of
conducting activities within the forum State.” Hanson v. Denckla , 357 U.S.
235 , 253 (1958). The contacts must be the defendant’s own
choice and not “random, isolated, or fortuitous.” Keeton v. Hustler Magazine, Inc. , 465 U.S.
770 , 774 (1984). They must show that the defendant deliberately
“reached out beyond” its home—by, for example, “exploi[ting] a
market” in the forum State or entering a contractual relationship
centered there. Walden v. Fiore , 571 U.S.
277 , 285 (2014) (internal quotation marks and alterations
omitted). Yet even then—because the defendant is not “at home”—the
forum State may exercise jurisdiction in only certain cases. The
plaintiff ’s claims, we have often stated, “must arise out of
or relate to the defendant’s contacts” with the forum. Bristol-Myers , 582 U. S., at ___ (slip op., at 5)
(quoting Daimler , 571 U. S., at 127; alterations
omitted); see, e.g., Burger King , 471 U. S., at
472; Helicopteros Nacionales de Colombia, S. A. v. Hall , 466 U.S.
408 , 414 (1984); International Shoe , 326 U. S., at
319. Or put just a bit differently, “there must be ‘an affiliation
between the forum and the underlying controversy, principally, [an]
activity or an occurrence that takes place in the forum State and
is therefore subject to the State’s regulation.’ ” Bristol-Myers , 582 U. S., at ___−___, ___ (slip op., at
5−6, 7) (quoting Goodyear , 564 U. S., at 919).

															These rules derive from and reflect two sets of
values—treating defendants fairly and protecting “interstate
federalism.” World-Wide Volkswagen Corp. v. Woodson , 444 U.S.
286 , 293 (1980); see id., at 297–298. Our decision in International Shoe founded specific jurisdiction on an idea
of reciprocity between a defendant and a State: When (but only
when) a company “exercises the privilege of conducting activities
within a state”—thus “enjoy[ing] the benefits and protection of
[its] laws”—the State may hold the company to account for related
misconduct. 326 U. S., at 319; see Burger King , 471
U. S., at 475−476. Later decisions have added that our
doctrine similarly provides defendants with “fair
warning”—knowledge that “a particular activity may subject [it] to
the jurisdiction of a foreign sovereign.” Id., at 472
(internal quotation marks omitted); World-Wide Volkswagen ,
444 U. S., at 297 (likewise referring to “clear notice”). A
defendant can thus “structure [its] primary conduct” to lessen or
avoid exposure to a given State’s courts. Id. , at 297. And
this Court has considered alongside defendants’ interests those of
the States in relation to each other. One State’s “sovereign power
to try” a suit, we have recognized, may prevent “sister States”
from exercising their like authority. Id., at 293. The law
of specific jurisdiction thus seeks to ensure that States with
“little legitimate interest” in a suit do not encroach on States
more affected by the controversy. Bristol-Myers , 582
U. S., at ___ (slip op., at 6).[ 2 ]

															B

															Ford contends that our jurisdictional rules
prevent Montana’s and Minnesota’s courts from deciding these two
suits. In making that argument, Ford does not contest that it does
substantial business in Montana and Minnesota—that it actively
seeks to serve the market for automobiles and related products in
those States. See Brief for Petitioner 6, 9, 13. Or to put that
concession in more doctrinal terms, Ford agrees that it has
“purposefully avail[ed] itself of the privilege of conducting
activities” in both places. Hanson , 357 U. S., at 253;
see supra, at 5−6. Ford’s claim is instead that those
activities do not sufficiently connect to the suits, even though
the resident-plaintiffs allege that Ford cars malfunctioned in the
forum States. In Ford’s view, the needed link must be causal in
nature: Jurisdiction attaches “only if the defendant’s forum
conduct gave rise to the plaintiff ’s claims.” Brief
for Petitioner 13 (emphasis in original). And that rule reduces,
Ford thinks, to locating specific jurisdiction in the State where
Ford sold the car in question, or else the States where Ford
designed and manufactured the vehicle. See id., at 2; Reply
Brief 2, 19; supra, at 3 (identifying those States). On that
view, the place of accident and injury is immaterial. So (Ford
says) Montana’s and Minnesota’s courts have no power over these
cases.

															But Ford’s causation-only approach finds no
support in this Court’s requirement of a “connection” between a
plaintiff ’s suit and a defendant’s activities. Bristol - Myers , 582 U. S., at ___ (slip op., at
8). That rule indeed serves to narrow the class of claims over
which a state court may exercise specific jurisdiction. But not
quite so far as Ford wants. None of our precedents has suggested
that only a strict causal relationship between the defendant’s
in-state activity and the litigation will do. As just noted, our
most common formulation of the rule demands that the suit “arise
out of or relate to the defendant’s contacts with the
forum.” Id ., at ___ (slip op., at 5) (quoting Daimler , 571 U. S., at 127; emphasis added; alterations
omitted); see supra, at 6. The first half of that standard
asks about causation; but the back half, after the “or,”
contemplates that some relationships will support jurisdiction
without a causal showing. That does not mean anything goes. In the
sphere of specific jurisdiction, the phrase “relate to”
incorporates real limits, as it must to adequately protect
defendants foreign to a forum. But again, we have never framed the
specific jurisdiction inquiry as always requiring proof of
causation— i.e., proof that the plaintiff ’s claim came
about because of the defendant’s in-state conduct. See also Bristol-Myers , 582 U. S., at ___, ___ (slip op., at 5,
7) (quoting Goodyear , 564 U. S., at 919) (asking
whether there is “an affiliation between the forum and the
underlying controversy,” without demanding that the inquiry focus
on cause). So the case is not over even if, as Ford argues, a
causal test would put jurisdiction in only the States of first
sale, manufacture, and design. A different State’s courts may yet
have jurisdiction, because of another “activity [or] occurrence”
involving the defendant that takes place in the State. Bristol-
Myers , 582 U. S., at ___, ___ (slip op., at 6, 7) (quoting Goodyear , 564 U. S., at 919).[ 3 ]

															And indeed, this Court has stated that specific
jurisdiction attaches in cases identical to the ones here—when a
company like Ford serves a market for a product in the forum State
and the product malfunctions there. In World-Wide
Volkswagen , the Court held that an Oklahoma court could not
assert jurisdiction over a New York car dealer just because a car
it sold later caught fire in Oklahoma. 444 U. S., at 295. But
in so doing, we contrasted the dealer’s position to that of two
other defendants—Audi, the car’s manufacturer, and Volkswagen, the
car’s nationwide importer (neither of which contested
jurisdiction):

															“[I]f the sale of a product of a
manufacturer or distributor such as Audi or Volkswagen is not
simply an isolated occurrence, but arises from the efforts of the
manufacturer or distributor to serve, directly or indirectly, the
market for its product in [several or all] other 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.” Id. , at 297.

															Or said another way, if Audi and Volkswagen’s
business deliberately extended into Oklahoma (among other States),
then Oklahoma’s courts could hold the companies accountable for a
car’s catching fire there—even though the vehicle had been designed
and made overseas and sold in New York. For, the Court explained, a
company thus “purposefully avail[ing] itself ” of the Oklahoma
auto market “has clear notice” of its exposure in that State to
suits arising from local accidents involving its cars. Ibid. And the company could do something about that exposure: It could
“act to alleviate the risk of burdensome litigation by procuring
insurance, passing the expected costs on to customers, or, if the
risks are [still] too great, severing its connection with the
State.” Ibid. Our conclusion in World-Wide
Volkswagen —though, as Ford notes, technically “dicta,” Brief
for Petitioner 34—has appeared and reappeared in many cases since.
So, for example, the Court in Keeton invoked that part of World-Wide Volkswagen to show that when a corporation has
“continuously and deliberately exploited [a State’s] market, it
must reasonably anticipate being haled into [that State’s]
court[s]” to defend actions “based on” products causing injury
there. 465 U. S., at 781 (citing 444 U. S., at 297–298);
see Burger King , 471 U. S., at 472–473 (similarly
citing World-Wide Volkswagen ). On two other occasions, we
reaffirmed that rule by reciting the above block-quoted language
verbatim. See Goodyear , 564 U. S., at 927; Asahi
Metal Industry Co. v. Superior Court of Cal., Solano
Cty. , 480 U.S.
102 , 110 (1987) (opinion of O’Connor, J.). And in Daimler , we used the Audi/Volkswagen scenario as a paradigm
case of specific jurisdiction (though now naming Daimler, the maker
of Mercedes Benzes). Said the Court, to “illustrate[ ]”
specific jurisdiction’s “province[ ]”: A California court
would exercise specific jurisdiction “if a California plaintiff,
injured in a California accident involving a Daimler-manufactured
vehicle, sued Daimler [in that court] alleging that the vehicle was
defectively designed.” 571 U. S., at 127, n. 5. As in World-Wide Volkswagen , the Court did not limit
jurisdiction to where the car was designed, manufactured, or first
sold. Substitute Ford for Daimler, Montana and Minnesota for
California, and the Court’s “illustrat[ive]” case becomes
. . . the two cases before us.

															To see why Ford is subject to jurisdiction in
these cases (as Audi, Volkswagen, and Daimler were in their
analogues), consider first the business that the company regularly
conducts in Montana and Minnesota. See generally 395 Mont., at 488,
443 P. 3d, at 414; 931 N. W. 2d, at 748; supra, at
3−4. Small wonder that Ford has here conceded “purposeful
availment” of the two States’ markets. See supra, at 7−8. By
every means imaginable—among them, billboards, TV and radio spots,
print ads, and direct mail—Ford urges Montanans and Minnesotans to
buy its vehicles, including (at all relevant times) Explorers and
Crown Victorias. Ford cars—again including those two models—are
available for sale, whether new or used, throughout the States, at
36 dealerships in Montana and 84 in Minnesota. And apart from
sales, Ford works hard to foster ongoing connections to its cars’
owners. The company’s dealers in Montana and Minnesota (as
elsewhere) regularly maintain and repair Ford cars, including those
whose warranties have long since expired. And the company
distributes replacement parts both to its own dealers and to
independent auto shops in the two States. Those activities, too,
make Ford money. And by making it easier to own a Ford, they
encourage Montanans and Minnesotans to become lifelong Ford
drivers.

															Now turn to how all this Montana- and
Minnesota-based conduct relates to the claims in these cases,
brought by state residents in Montana’s and Minnesota’s courts.
Each plaintiff ’s suit, of course, arises from a car accident
in one of those States. In each complaint, the resident-plaintiff
alleges that a defective Ford vehicle—an Explorer in one, a Crown
Victoria in the other—caused the crash and resulting harm. And as
just described, Ford had advertised, sold, and serviced those two
car models in both States for many years. (Contrast a case, which
we do not address, in which Ford marketed the models in only a
different State or region.) In other words, Ford had systematically
served a market in Montana and Minnesota for the very vehicles that
the plaintiffs allege malfunctioned and injured them in those
States. So there is a strong “relationship among the defendant, the
forum, and the litigation”—the “essential foundation” of specific
jurisdiction. Helicopteros , 466 U. S., at 414 (internal
quotation marks omitted). That is why this Court has used this
exact fact pattern (a resident-plaintiff sues a global car company,
extensively serving the state market in a vehicle, for an in-state
accident) as an illustration—even a paradigm example—of how
specific jurisdiction works. See Daimler , 571 U. S., at
127, n. 5; supra, at 11.[ 4 ]

															The only complication here, pressed by Ford, is
that the company sold the specific cars involved in these crashes
outside the forum States, with consumers later selling them to the
States’ residents. Because that is so, Ford argues, the plaintiffs’
claims “would be precisely the same if Ford had never done anything
in Montana and Minnesota.” Brief for Petitioner 46. Of course, that
argument merely restates Ford’s demand for an exclusively causal
test of connection—which we have already shown is inconsistent with
our caselaw. See Tr. of Oral Arg. 4; supra , at 8−9. And
indeed, a similar assertion could have been made in World-Wide Volkswagen —yet the Court made clear that
systematic contacts in Oklahoma rendered Audi accountable there for
an in-state accident, even though it involved a car sold in New
York. See supra, at 9−10. So too here, and for the same
reasons, see supra, at 11−12—even supposing (as Ford does)
that without the company’s Montana or Minnesota contacts the
plaintiffs’ claims would be just the same.

															But in any event, that assumption is far from
clear. For the owners of these cars might never have bought them,
and so these suits might never have arisen, except for Ford’s
contacts with their home States. Those contacts might turn any
resident of Montana or Minnesota into a Ford owner—even when he
buys his car from out of state. He may make that purchase because
he saw ads for the car in local media. And he may take into account
a raft of Ford’s in-state activities designed to make driving a
Ford convenient there: that Ford dealers stand ready to service the
car; that other auto shops have ample supplies of Ford parts; and
that Ford fosters an active resale market for its old models. The
plaintiffs here did not in fact establish, or even allege, such
causal links. But cf. post, at 3–4 (Alito, J., concurring in
judgment) (nonetheless finding some kind of causation). Nor should
jurisdiction in cases like these ride on the exact reasons for an
individual plaintiff ’s purchase, or on his ability to present
persuasive evidence about them.[ 5 ] But the possibilities listed above—created by the reach
of Ford’s Montana and Minnesota contacts—underscore the aptness of
finding jurisdiction here, even though the cars at issue were first
sold out of state.

															For related reasons, allowing jurisdiction in
these cases treats Ford fairly, as this Court’s precedents explain.
In conducting so much business in Montana and Minnesota, Ford
“enjoys the benefits and protection of [their] laws”—the
enforcement of contracts, the defense of property, the resulting
formation of effective markets. International Shoe , 326
U. S., at 319. All that assistance to Ford’s in-state business
creates reciprocal obligations—most relevant here, that the car
models Ford so extensively markets in Montana and Minnesota be safe
for their citizens to use there. Thus our repeated conclusion: A
state court’s enforcement of that commitment, enmeshed as it is
with Ford’s government-protected in-state business, can “hardly be
said to be undue.” Ibid. ; see supra, at 10−11. And as World-Wide Volkswagen described, it cannot be thought
surprising either. An automaker regularly marketing a vehicle in a
State, the Court said, has “clear notice” that it will be subject
to jurisdiction in the State’s courts when the product malfunctions
there (regardless where it was first sold). 444 U. S., at 297;
see supra, at 10. Precisely because that exercise of
jurisdiction is so reasonable, it is also predictable—and thus
allows Ford to “structure [its] primary conduct” to lessen or even
avoid the costs of state-court litigation. World-Wide Volkswagen , 444 U. S., at 297.

															Finally, principles of “interstate federalism”
support jurisdiction over these suits in Montana and Minnesota. Id. , at 293. Those States have significant interests at
stake—“providing [their] residents with a convenient forum for
redressing injuries inflicted by out-of-state actors,” as well as
enforcing their own safety regulations. Burger King , 471
U. S., at 473; see Keeton , 465 U. S., at 776.
Consider, next to those, the interests of the States of first sale
(Washington and North Dakota)—which Ford’s proposed rule would make
the most likely forums. For each of those States, the suit involves
all out-of-state parties, an out-of-state accident, and
out-of-state injuries; the suit’s only connection with the State is
that a former owner once (many years earlier) bought the car there.
In other words, there is a less significant “relationship among the
defendant, the forum, and the litigation.” Walden , 571
U. S., at 284 (internal quotation marks omitted). So by
channeling these suits to Washington and North Dakota, Ford’s
regime would undermine, rather than promote, what the company calls
the Due Process Clause’s “jurisdiction-allocating function.” Brief
for Petitioner 24.

															C

															Ford mainly relies for its rule on two of our
recent decisions— Bristol-Myers and Walden . But those
precedents stand for nothing like the principle Ford derives from
them. If anything, they reinforce all we have said about why
Montana’s and Minnesota’s courts can decide these cases.

															Ford says of Bristol-Myers that it
“squarely foreclose[s]” jurisdiction. Reply Brief 2. In that case,
non-resident plaintiffs brought claims in California state court
against Bristol-Myers Squibb, the manufacturer of a nationally
marketed prescription drug called Plavix. The plaintiffs had not
bought Plavix in California; neither had they used or suffered any
harm from the drug there. Still, the California Supreme Court
thought it could exercise jurisdiction because Bristol-Myers Squibb
sold Plavix in California and was defending there against identical
claims brought by the State’s residents. This Court disagreed,
holding that the exercise of jurisdiction violated the Fourteenth
Amendment. In Ford’s view, the same must be true here. Each of
these plaintiffs, like the plaintiffs in Bristol-Myers ,
alleged injury from a particular item (a car, a pill) that the
defendant had sold outside the forum State. Ford reads Bristol-Myers to preclude jurisdiction when that is true,
even if the defendant regularly sold “the same kind of
product” in the State. Reply Brief 2 (emphasis in original).

															But that reading misses the point of our
decision. We found jurisdiction improper in Bristol-Myers because the forum State, and the defendant’s activities there,
lacked any connection to the plaintiffs’ claims. See 582
U. S., at ___ (slip op., at 8) (“What is needed—and what is
missing here—is a connection between the forum and the specific
claims at issue”). The plaintiffs, the Court explained, were not
residents of California. They had not been prescribed Plavix in
California. They had not ingested Plavix in California. And they
had not sustained their injuries in California. See ibid. (emphasizing these points). In short, the plaintiffs were engaged
in forum-shopping—suing in California because it was thought
plaintiff-friendly, even though their cases had no tie to the
State. See id., at ___ (slip op., at 10) (distinguishing the
Plavix claims from the litigation in Keeton , see supra, at 10, because they “involv[e] no in-state injury and
no injury to residents of the forum State”). That is not at all
true of the cases before us. Yes, Ford sold the specific products
in other States, as Bristol-Myers Squibb had. But here, the
plaintiffs are residents of the forum States. They used the
allegedly defective products in the forum States. And they suffered
injuries when those products malfunctioned in the forum States. In
sum, each of the plaintiffs brought suit in the most natural
State—based on an “affiliation between the forum and the underlying
controversy, principally, [an] activity or an occurrence that
t[ook] place” there. Bristol-Myers , 582 U. S., at
___−___, ___ (slip op., at 5−6, 7) (internal quotation marks
omitted). So Bristol-Myers does not bar jurisdiction.

															Ford falls back on Walden as its last
resort. In that case, a Georgia police officer working at an
Atlanta airport searched, and seized money from, two Nevada
residents before they embarked on a flight to Las Vegas. The
victims of the search sued the officer in Nevada, arguing that
their alleged injury (their inability to use the seized money)
occurred in the State in which they lived. This Court held the
exercise of jurisdiction in Nevada improper even though “the
plaintiff[s] experienced [the] effect[s]” of the officer’s conduct
there. 571 U. S., at 290. According to Ford, our ruling shows
that a plaintiff ’s residence and place of injury can never
support jurisdiction. See Brief for Petitioner 32. And without
those facts, Ford concludes, the basis for jurisdiction crumbles
here as well.

															But Walden has precious little to do with
the cases before us. In Walden , only the plaintiffs had any
contacts with the State of Nevada; the defendant-officer had never
taken any act to “form[ ] a contact” of his own. 571
U. S., at 290. The officer had “never traveled to, conducted
activities within, contacted anyone in, or sent anything or anyone
to Nevada . ” Id. , at 289. So to use the language of
our doctrinal test: He had not “purposefully avail[ed himself] of
the privilege of conducting activities” in the forum State. Hanson , 357 U. S., at 253. Because that was true, the
Court had no occasion to address the necessary connection between a
defendant’s in-state activity and the plaintiff ’s claims. But
here, Ford has a veritable truckload of contacts with Montana and
Minnesota, as it admits. See supra, at 11−12. The only issue
is whether those contacts are related enough to the plaintiffs’
suits. As to that issue, so what if (as Walden held) the
place of a plaintiff ’s injury and residence cannot create a
defendant’s contact with the forum State? Those places still may be
relevant in assessing the link between the defendant’s forum
contacts and the plaintiff ’s suit—including its assertions of
who was injured where. And indeed, that relevance is a key part of Bristol-Myers ’ reasoning. See 582 U. S., at ___ (slip
op., at 9) (finding a lack of “connection” in part because the
“plaintiffs are not California residents and do not claim to have
suffered harm in that State”). One of Ford’s own favorite cases
thus refutes its appeal to the other.

															*  *  *

															Here, resident-plaintiffs allege that they
suffered in-state injury because of defective products that Ford
extensively promoted, sold, and serviced in Montana and Minnesota.
For all the reasons we have given, the connection between the
plaintiffs’ claims and Ford’s activities in those States—or
otherwise said, the “relationship among the defendant, the
forum[s], and the litigation”—is close enough to support specific
jurisdiction. Walden , 571 U. S., at 284 (internal
quotation marks omitted). The judgments of the Montana and
Minnesota Supreme Courts are therefore affirmed.

															It is so ordered.

															Justice Barrett took no part in the
consideration or decision of these cases. Notes 1 Ford’s Brief in Support
of Motion to Dismiss in Lucero v. Ford Motor Co. , No.
DV–18–247 (8th Jud. Dist., Cascade Cty., Mont.), pp. 14−15;
Ford Motor Co.’s Memorandum in Support of Motion to Dismiss in No.
77–cv–16–1025 (7th Jud. Dist., Todd Cty., Minn.), pp. 11−12,
and n. 3. 2 One of the concurrences
here expresses a worry that our International Shoe -based
body of law is not “well suited for the way in which business is
now conducted,” and tentatively suggests a 21st-century rethinking. Post, at 1 (Alito, J., concurring in judgment). Fair enough
perhaps, see infra, at 12−13, n. 4, but the concurrence
then acknowledges that these cases have no distinctively modern
features, and it decides them on grounds that (as it agrees) are
much the same as ours. See post , at 3−4; compare ibid. with infra , at 11–15. The other concurrence
proposes instead a return to the mid-19th century—a replacement of
our current doctrine with the Fourteenth Amendment’s original
meaning respecting personal jurisdiction. Post, at 9−10
(Gorsuch, J., concurring in judgment). But that opinion never
reveals just what the Due Process Clause as understood at its
ratification required, and its ground for deciding these cases is
correspondingly spare. Post, at 11. This opinion, by
contrast, resolves these cases by proceeding as the Court has done
for the last 75 years—applying the standards set out in International Shoe and its progeny, with attention to their
underlying values of ensuring fairness and protecting interstate
federalism. 3 In thus reiterating this
Court’s longstanding approach, we reject Justice Gorsuch’s apparent
(if oblique) view that a state court should have jurisdiction over
a nationwide corporation like Ford on any claim, no matter
how unrelated to the State or Ford’s activities there. See post, at 11. On that view, for example, a California court
could hear a claim against Ford brought by an Ohio plaintiff based
on an accident occurring in Ohio involving a car purchased in Ohio.
Removing the need for any connection between the case and forum
State would transfigure our specific jurisdiction standard as
applied to corporations. “Case-linked” jurisdiction, see supra, at 5–6, would then become not case-linked at
all. 4 None of this is to say
that any person using any means to sell any good in a State is
subject to jurisdiction there if the product malfunctions after
arrival. We have long treated isolated or sporadic transactions
differently from continuous ones. See, e.g., World-Wide
Volkswagen Corp. v. Woodson , 444
U.S. 286 , 297 (1980); supra, at 6. And we do not here
consider internet transactions, which may raise doctrinal questions
of their own. See Walden v. Fiore , 571 U.S.
277 , 290, n. 9 (2014) (“[T]his case does not present the
very different questions whether and how a defendant’s virtual
‘presence’ and conduct translate into ‘contacts’ with a particular
State”). So consider, for example, a hypothetical offered at oral
argument. “[A] retired guy in a small town” in Maine “carves
decoys” and uses “a site on the Internet” to sell them. Tr. of Oral
Arg. 39. “Can he be sued in any state if some harm arises from the
decoy?” Ibid . The differences between that case and the ones
before us virtually list themselves. (Just consider all our
descriptions of Ford’s activities outside its home bases.) So we
agree with the plaintiffs’ counsel that resolving these cases does
not also resolve the hypothetical. See id., at
39−40. 5 It should, for example,
make no difference if a plaintiff had recently moved to the forum
State with his car, and had not made his purchasing decision with
that move in mind—so had not considered any of Ford’s activities in
his new home State. SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES

															_________________

															Nos. 19–368 and 19–369

															_________________

															FORD MOTOR COMPANY, PETITIONER

															19–368 v. MONTANA EIGHTH JUDICIAL DISTRICT COURT,
et al.

															on writ of certiorari to the supreme court of
montana

															FORD MOTOR COMPANY, PETITIONER

															19–369 v. ADAM BANDEMER

															on writ of certiorari to the supreme court of
minnesota

															[March 25, 2021]

															Justice Alito, concurring in the judgment.

															These cases can and should be decided without
any alteration or refinement of our case law on specific personal
jurisdiction. To be sure, for the reasons outlined in Justice
Gorsuch’s thoughtful opinion, there are grounds for questioning the
standard that the Court adopted in International Shoe Co. v. Washington , 326 U.S.
310 (1945). And there are also reasons to wonder whether the
case law we have developed since that time is well suited for the
way in which business is now conducted. But there is nothing
distinctively 21st century about the question in the cases now
before us, and the answer to that question is settled by our case
law.

															Since International Shoe, the rule has
been that a state court can exercise personal jurisdiction over a
defendant if the defendant has “minimum contacts” with the
forum—which means that the contacts must be “such that the
maintenance of the suit does not offend ‘traditional notions of
fair play and substantial justice.’ ” Id., at 316
(quoting Milliken v. Meyer , 311
U.S. 457 , 463 (1940)).

															That standard is easily met here. Ford has long
had a heavy presence in Minnesota and Montana. It spends billions
on national advertising. It has many franchises in both States.
Ford dealers in Minnesota and Montana sell and service Ford
vehicles, and Ford ships replacement parts to both States. In
entertaining these suits, Minnesota and Montana courts have not
reached out and grabbed suits in which they “have little legitimate
interest.” Bristol- Myers Squibb Co. v. Superior Court of
Cal., San Francisco Cty. , 582 U. S. ___, ___ (2017) (slip
op., at 6). Their residents, while riding in vehicles
purchased within their borders, were killed or injured in
accidents on their roads. Can anyone seriously argue that
requiring Ford to litigate these cases in Minnesota and Montana
would be fundamentally unfair?

															Well, Ford makes that argument. It would send
the plaintiffs packing to the jurisdictions where the vehicles in
question were assembled (Kentucky and Canada), designed (Michigan),
or first sold (Washington and North Dakota) or where Ford is
incorporated (Delaware) or has its principal place of business
(Michigan).

															As might have been predicted, the Court
unanimously rejects this understanding of “traditional notions of
fair play and substantial justice.” And in doing so, we merely
follow what we said in World-Wide Volkswagen Corp. v. Woodson , 444 U.S.
286 , 297–298 (1980), which was essentially this: If a car
manufacturer makes substantial efforts to sell vehicles in States A
and B (and other States), and a defect in a vehicle first sold in
State A causes injuries in an accident in State B, the manufacturer
can be sued in State B. That rule decides these cases.

															Ford, however, asks us to adopt an unprecedented
rule under which a defendant’s contacts with the forum State must
be proven to have been a but-for cause of the tort
plaintiff ’s injury. The Court properly rejects that argument,
and I agree with the main thrust of the Court’s opinion. My only
quibble is with the new gloss that the Court puts on our case law.
Several of our opinions have said that a plaintiff ’s claims
“ ‘must arise out of or relate to the defendant’s
contacts’ ” with the forum. See ante , at 6 (citing
cases). The Court parses this phrase “as though we were dealing
with language of a statute,” Reiter v. Sonotone
Corp. , 442 U.S.
330 , 341 (1979), and because this phrase is cast in the
disjunctive, the Court recognizes a new category of cases in which
personal jurisdiction is permitted: those in which the claims do
not “arise out of ” ( i.e. , are not caused by) the
defendant’s contacts but nevertheless sufficiently “relate to”
those contacts in some undefined way, ante , at 8–9.

															This innovation is unnecessary and, in my view,
unwise. To say that the Constitution does not require the kind of
proof of causation that Ford would demand—what the majority
describes as a “strict causal relationship,” ante, at 8—is
not to say that no causal link of any kind is needed. And here,
there is a sufficient link. It is reasonable to infer that the
vehicles in question here would never have been on the roads in
Minnesota and Montana if they were some totally unknown brand that
had never been advertised in those States, was not sold in those
States, would not be familiar to mechanics in those States, and
could not have been easily repaired with parts available in those
States. See ante, at 13–14 (describing this relationship
between Ford’s activities and these suits). The whole point of
those activities was to put more Fords (including those in question
here) on Minnesota and Montana roads. The common-sense relationship
between Ford’s activities and these suits, in other words, is
causal in a broad sense of the concept, and personal jurisdiction
can rest on this type of link without strict proof of the type Ford
would require. When “arise out of ” is understood in this way,
it is apparent that “arise out of ” and “relate to” overlap
and are not really two discrete grounds for jurisdiction. The
phrase “arise out of or relate to” is simply a way of restating the
basic “minimum contacts” standard adopted in International
Shoe .

															Recognizing “relate to” as an independent basis
for specific jurisdiction risks needless complications. The
“ordinary meaning” of the phrase “relate to” “is a broad one.” Morales v. Trans World Airlines, Inc. , 504 U.S.
374 , 383 (1992). Applying that phrase “according to its terms
[is] a project doomed to failure, since, as many a curbstone
philosopher has observed, everything is related to everything
else.” California Div. of Labor Standards Enforcement v. Dillingham Constr., N. A., Inc. , 519 U.S.
316 , 335 (1997) (Scalia, J., concurring). To rein in this
phrase, limits must be found, and the Court assures us that “relate
to,” as it now uses the concept, “incorporates real limits.” Ante, at 9. But without any indication what those limits
might be, I doubt that the lower courts will find that observation
terribly helpful. Instead, what limits the potentially boundless
reach of “relate to” is just the sort of rough causal connection I
have described.

															I would leave the law exactly where it stood
before we took these cases, and for that reason, I concur in the
judgment. SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES

															_________________

															Nos. 19–368 and 19–369

															_________________

															FORD MOTOR COMPANY, PETITIONER

															19–368 v. MONTANA EIGHTH JUDICIAL DISTRICT COURT,
et al.

															on writ of certiorari to the supreme court of
montana

															FORD MOTOR COMPANY, PETITIONER

															19–369 v. ADAM BANDEMER

															on writ of certiorari to the supreme court of
minnesota

															[March 25, 2021]

															Justice Gorsuch, with whom Justice Thomas
joins, concurring in the judgment.

															Since International Shoe Co. v. Washington , 326 U.S.
310 (1945), this Court’s cases have sought to divide the world
of personal jurisdiction in two. A tribunal with “general
jurisdiction” may entertain any claim against the defendant. But to
trigger this power, a court usually must ensure the defendant is
“ ‘at home’ ” in the forum State. Daimler AG v. Bauman , 571 U.S.
117 , 137 (2014). Meanwhile, “specific jurisdiction” affords a
narrower authority. It applies only when the defendant
“ ‘purposefully avails’ ” itself of the opportunity to do
business in the forum State and the suit “ ‘arise[s] out of or
relate[s] to’ ” the defendant’s contacts with the forum State. Burger King Corp. v. Rudzewicz , 471 U.S.
462 , 472, 475 (1985).

															While our cases have long admonished lower
courts to keep these concepts distinct, some of the old guardrails
have begun to look a little battered. Take general jurisdiction. If
it made sense to speak of a corporation having one or two “homes”
in 1945, it seems almost quaint in 2021 when corporations with
global reach often have massive operations spread across multiple
States. To cope with these changing economic realities, this Court
has begun cautiously expanding the old rule in “ ‘exceptional
case[s].’ ” BNSF R. Co. v. Tyrrell , 581
U. S. ___, ___ (2017) (slip op., at 10).

															Today’s case tests the old boundaries from
another direction. Until now, many lower courts have proceeded on
the premise that specific jurisdiction requires two things. First,
the defendant must “purposefully avail” itself of the chance to do
business in a State. Second, the plaintiff ’s suit must “arise
out of or relate to” the defendant’s in-state activities.
Typically, courts have read this second phrase as a unit requiring
at least a but-for causal link between the defendant’s local
activities and the plaintiff ’s injuries. E.g., Tamburo v. Dworkin , 601 F.3d 693, 708–709 (CA7 2010)
(collecting cases); see also Burger King , 471 U. S., at
475 (discussing “proximate[ ] results”). As every first year
law student learns, a but-for causation test isn’t the most
demanding. At a high level of abstraction, one might say any event
in the world would not have happened “but for” events far and long
removed.

															Now, though, the Court pivots away from this
understanding. Focusing on the phrase “arise out of or relate to”
that so often appears in our cases, the majority asks us to parse
those words “as though we were dealing with language of a statute.” Reiter v. Sonotone Corp. , 442
U.S. 330 , 341 (1979). In particular, the majority zeros in on
the disjunctive conjunction “or,” and proceeds to build its entire
opinion around that linguistic feature. Ante , at 8–9. The
majority admits that “arise out of ” may connote causation.
But, it argues, “relate to” is an independent clause that does
not.

															Where this leaves us is far from clear. For a
case to “relate to” the defendant’s forum contacts, the majority
says, it is enough if an “affiliation” or “relationship” or
“connection” exists between them. Ante, at 6, 12, 16. But
what does this assortment of nouns mean ? Loosed from any
causation standard, we are left to guess. The majority promises
that its new test “does not mean anything goes,” but that hardly
tells us what does. Ante, at 9. In some cases, the new test
may prove more forgiving than the old causation rule. But it’s hard
not to wonder whether it may also sometimes turn out to be more
demanding. Unclear too is whether, in cases like that, the majority
would treat causation and “affiliation” as alternative routes to
specific jurisdiction, or whether it would deny jurisdiction
outright.

															For a glimpse at the complications invited by
today’s decision, consider its treatment of North Dakota and
Washington. Those are the States where Ford first sold the
allegedly defective cars at issue in the cases before us. The
majority seems to suggest that, if the plaintiffs had sought to
bring their suits in those States, they would have failed. The
majority stresses that the “only connection” between the
plaintiffs’ claims and North Dakota and Washington is the fact that
former owners once bought the allegedly defective cars there. Ante, at 15. But the majority never tells us why that
“connection” isn’t enough. Surely, North Dakota and Washington
would contend they have a strong interest in ensuring they don’t
become marketplaces for unreasonably dangerous products. Nor is it
clear why the majority casts doubt on the availability of specific
jurisdiction in these States without bothering to consider whether
the old causation test might allow it. After all, no one doubts
Ford purposefully availed itself of those markets. The plaintiffs’
injuries, at least arguably, “arose from” (or were caused by) the
sale of defective cars in those places. Even if the majority’s new
affiliation test isn’t satisfied, don’t we still need to ask those
causation questions, or are they now to be abandoned?

															Consider, too, a hypothetical the majority
offers in a footnote. The majority imagines a retiree in Maine who
starts a one-man business, carving and selling wooden duck decoys.
In time, the man sells a defective decoy over the Internet to a
purchaser in another State who is injured. See ante , at 13,
n. 4. We aren’t told how. (Was the decoy coated in lead
paint?) But put that aside. The majority says this hypothetical
supplies a useful study in contrast with our cases. On the
majority’s telling, Ford’s “continuous” contacts with Montana and
Minnesota are enough to establish an “affiliation” with those
States; by comparison, the decoy seller’s contacts may be too
“isolated” and “sporadic” to entitle an injured buyer to sue in his
home State. But if this comparison highlights anything, it is only
the litigation sure to follow. For between the poles of
“continuous” and “isolated” contacts lie a virtually infinite
number of “affiliations” waiting to be explored. And when it comes
to that vast terrain, the majority supplies no meaningful guidance
about what kind or how much of an “affiliation” will suffice. Nor,
once more, does the majority tell us whether its new affiliation
test supplants or merely supplements the old causation inquiry.

															Not only does the majority’s new test risk
adding new layers of confusion to our personal jurisdiction
jurisprudence. The whole project seems unnecessary. Immediately
after disavowing any need for a causal link between the defendant’s
forum activities and the plaintiffs’ injuries, the majority
proceeds to admit that such a link may be present here. Ante, at 14. The majority stresses that the Montana and
Minnesota plaintiffs before us “might” have purchased their cars
because of Ford’s activities in their home States. They “may” have
relied on Ford’s local advertising. And they “may” have depended on
Ford’s promise to furnish in-state servicers and dealers. If the
majority is right about these things, that would be more than
enough to establish a but-for causal link between Ford’s in-state
activities and the plaintiffs’ decisions to purchase their
allegedly defective vehicles. Nor should that result come as a
surprise: One might expect such causal links to be easy to prove in
suits against corporate behemoths like Ford. All the new
euphemisms—“affiliation,” “relationship,” “connection”—thus seem
pretty pointless.[ 1 ]

															*

															With the old International Shoe dichotomy looking increasingly uncertain, it’s hard not to ask how
we got here and where we might be headed.

															Before International Shoe , it seems due
process was usually understood to guarantee that only a court of
competent jurisdiction could deprive a defendant of his life,
liberty, or property. In turn, a court’s competency normally
depended on the defendant’s presence in, or consent to, the
sovereign’s jurisdiction. But once a plaintiff was able to “tag”
the defendant with process in the jurisdiction, that State’s courts
were generally thought competent to render judgment on any claim
against the defendant, whether it involved events inside or outside
the State. Pennoyer v. Neff , 95 U.S.
714 , 733 (1878); Burnham v. Superior Court of
Cal. , County of Marin , 495
U.S. 604 , 610–611 (1990); J. Story, Commentaries on the
Conflict of Laws 912–913 (3d ed. 1846); Massie v. Watts , 6 Cranch 148, 157, 161–162 (1810).[ 2 ] International Shoe ’s emergence may be
attributable to many influences, but at least part of the story
seems to involve the rise of corporations and interstate trade. See Honda Motor Co. v. Oberg , 512
U.S. 415 , 431 (1994). A corporation doing business in its State
of incorporation is one thing; the old physical presence rules for
individuals seem easily adaptable to them. But what happens when a
corporation, created and able to operate thanks to the laws of one
State, seeks the privilege of sending agents or products into
another State?

															Early on, many state courts held conduct like
that renders an out-of-state corporation present in the second
jurisdiction. And a present company could be sued for any claim, so
long as the plaintiff served an employee doing corporate business
within the second State. E.g. , Pennsylvania Lumbermen’s
Mut. Fire Ins. Co. v. Meyer , 197
U.S. 407 , 413–415 (1905). Other States sought to obviate any
potential question about corporate jurisdiction by requiring an
out-of-state corporation to incorporate under their laws too, or at
least designate an agent for service of process. Either way, the
idea was to secure the out-of-state company’s presence or consent
to suit. E.g. , Pennsylvania Fire Ins. Co. of
Philadelphia v. Gold Issue Mining & Milling Co. , 243 U.S.
93 , 95–96 (1917).

															Unsurprisingly, corporations soon looked for
ways around rules like these. No one, after all, has ever liked
greeting the process server. For centuries, individuals facing
imminent suit sought to avoid it by fleeing the court’s territorial
jurisdiction. But this tactic proved “too crude for the American
business genius,” and it held some obvious disadvantages. See
Jackson, What Price “Due Process, ” 5 N. Y. L. Rev. 435, 436
(1927). Corporations wanted to retain the privilege of sending
their personnel and products to other jurisdictions where they
lacked a charter to do business. At the same time, when confronted
with lawsuits in the second forum, they sought to hide behind their
foreign charters and deny their presence. Really, their strategy
was to do business without being seen to do business. Id .,
at 438 (“No longer is the foreign corporation confronted with the
problem ‘to be or not to be’—it can both be and not be!”).

															Initially and routinely, state courts rejected
ploys like these. See, e.g., Pullman Palace Car Co. v. Lawrence , 74 Miss. 782, 796–799, 22 So. 53, 55–56 (Miss.
1897). But, in a series of decisions at the turn of the last
century, this Court eventually provided a more receptive audience.
On the one hand, the Court held that an out-of-state corporation
often has a right to do business in another State unencumbered by
that State’s registration rules, thanks to the so-called dormant
Commerce Clause. International Textbook Co. v. Pigg , 217 U.S.
91 , 107–112 (1910). On the other hand, the Court began invoking
the Due Process Clause to restrict the circumstances in which an
out-of-state corporation could be deemed present. So, for example,
the Court ruled that even an Oklahoma corporation purchasing a
large portion of its merchandise in New York was not “doing
business” there. Rosenberg Bros. & Co. v. Curtis Brown Co. , 260 U.S.
516 , 517–518 (1923). Perhaps advocates of this arrangement
thought it promoted national economic growth. See Dodd,
Jurisdiction in Personal Actions, 23 Ill. L. Rev. 427, 444–445
(1929). But critics questioned its fidelity to the Constitution and
traditional jurisdictional principles, noting that it often left
injured parties with no practical forum for their claims too.
Jackson, 5 N. Y. L. Rev., at 436–438.

															In many ways, International Shoe sought
to start over. The Court “cast . . . aside” the old
concepts of territorial jurisdiction that its own earlier decisions
had seemingly twisted in favor of out-of-state corporations. Burnham , 495 U. S., at 618. At the same time, the Court also cast doubt on the idea, once pursued by many state
courts, that a company “consents” to suit when it is forced to
incorporate or designate an agent for receipt of process in a
jurisdiction other than its home State. Ibid .[ 3 ] In place of nearly everything that had
come before, the Court sought to build a new test focused on
“ ‘traditional notions of fair play and substantial
justice.’ ” International Shoe , 326 U. S., at 316
(quoting Milliken v. Meyer , 311
U.S. 457 , 463 (1940)).

															It was a heady promise. But it is unclear how
far it has really taken us. Even today, this Court usually
considers corporations “at home” and thus subject to general
jurisdiction in only one or two States. All in a world where global
conglomerates boast of their many “headquarters.” The Court has
issued these restrictive rulings, too, even though individual defendants remain subject to the old “tag” rule,
allowing them to be sued on any claim anywhere they can be found. Burnham , 495 U. S., at 610–611.[ 4 ] Nearly 80 years removed from International
Shoe , it seems corporations continue to receive special
jurisdictional protections in the name of the Constitution. Less
clear is why.

															Maybe, too, International Shoe just
doesn’t work quite as well as it once did. For a period, its
specific jurisdiction test might have seemed a reasonable new
substitute for assessing corporate “presence,” a way to identify
those out-of-state corporations that were simply pretending to be
absent from jurisdictions where they were really transacting
business. When a company “purposefully availed” itself of the
benefits of another State’s market in the 1940s, it often involved
sending in agents, advertising in local media, or developing a
network of on-the-ground dealers, much as Ford did in these cases. E.g., International Shoe , 326 U. S., at 313–314,
320. But, today, even an individual retiree carving wooden decoys
in Maine can “purposefully avail” himself of the chance to do
business across the continent after drawing online orders to his
e-Bay “store” thanks to Internet advertising with global reach. Ante , at 12–13, n. 4. A test once aimed at keeping
corporations honest about their out-of-state operations now
seemingly risks hauling individuals to jurisdictions where they
have never set foot.

															Perhaps this is the real reason why the majority
introduces us to the hypothetical decoy salesman. Yes, he arguably
availed himself of a new market. Yes, the plaintiff ’s
injuries arguably arose from (or were caused by) the product he
sold there. Yes, International Shoe ’s old causation test
would seemingly allow for personal jurisdiction. But maybe the
majority resists that conclusion because the old test no longer
seems as reliable a proxy for determining corporate presence as it
once did. Maybe that’s the intuition lying behind the
majority’s introduction of its new “affiliation” rule and its
comparison of the Maine retiree’s “sporadic” and “isolated” sales
in the plaintiff ’s State and Ford’s deep “relationships” and
“connections” with Montana and Minnesota. Ante, at 13,
n. 4.

															If that is the logic at play here, I cannot help
but wonder if we are destined to return where we began. Perhaps all
of this Court’s efforts since International Shoe , including
those of today’s majority, might be understood as seeking to
recreate in new terms a jurisprudence about corporate jurisdiction
that was developing before this Court’s muscular interventions in
the early 20th century. Perhaps it was, is, and in the end always
will be about trying to assess fairly a corporate defendant’s
presence or consent. International Shoe may have sought to
move past those questions. But maybe all we have done since is
struggle for new words to express the old ideas. Perhaps, too, none
of this should come as a surprise. New technologies and new schemes
to evade the process server will always be with us. But if our
concern is with “ ‘ traditional notions of fair play and
substantial justice,’ ” International Shoe , 326
U. S., at 316 (emphasis added), not just our personal and
idiosyncratic impressions of those things, perhaps we will always
wind up asking variations of the same questions.[ 5 ]

															None of this is to cast doubt on the outcome of
these cases. The parties have not pointed to anything in the
Constitution’s original meaning or its history that might allow
Ford to evade answering the plaintiffs’ claims in Montana or
Minnesota courts. No one seriously questions that the company,
seeking to do business, entered those jurisdictions through the
front door. And I cannot see why, when faced with the process
server, it should be allowed to escape out the back. Jackson, 5
N. Y. L. Rev., at 439. The real struggle here isn’t with
settling on the right outcome in these cases, but with making sense
of our personal jurisdiction jurisprudence and International
Shoe ’s increasingly doubtful dichotomy. On those scores, I
readily admit that I finish these cases with even more questions
than I had at the start. Hopefully, future litigants and lower
courts will help us face these tangles and sort out a responsible
way to address the challenges posed by our changing economy in
light of the Constitution’s text and the lessons of history. Notes 1 The majority says
personal jurisdiction should not turn on a plain-tiff’s ability to
“allege” or “establish” his or her reasons for doing business with
the defendant. Ante , at 14. But the implicit assumption
here—that the plaintiff bears the burden of proving personal
jurisdiction—is often mistaken. Perhaps because a lack of personal
jurisdiction is a waivable affirmative defense, some States place
the burden of proving the defense on the defendant. Even in places
where the plaintiff bears the burden, I fail to see why it would be
so terrible (or burdensome) to require an individual to plead and
prove his or her reasons for purchase. Frequently, doing so may be
simple—far simpler than showing how the defendant’s connections
with the jurisdiction satisfy a new and amorphous “affiliation”
test. 2 Some disagree that due
process requires even this much. Recent scholarship, for example,
contends Pennoyer ’s territorial account of sovereign power
is mostly right, but the rules it embodies are not “fixed in
constitutional amber”—that is, Congress might be able to change
them. Sachs, Pennoyer Was Right, 95 Texas L. Rev. 1249,
1255 (2017). Others suggest that fights over personal jurisdiction
would be more sensibly waged under the Full Faith and Credit
Clause. Jackson, Full Faith and Credit—The Lawyer’s Clause of the
Constitution, 45 Colum. L. Rev. 1, 3 (1945). Whether these
theories are right or wrong, they at least seek to answer the right
question—what the Constitution as originally understood requires,
not what nine judges consider “fair” and “just.” 3 It is unclear what
remains of the old “consent” theory after International
Shoe ’s criticism. Some courts read International Shoe and the cases that follow as effectively foreclosing it, while
others insist it remains viable. Compare Lanham v. BNSF
R. Co. , 305 Neb. 124, 130–136, 939 N.W.2d 363, 368–371 (Neb.
2020), with Rodriguez v. Ford Motor Co. ,
2019-NMCA-023, ¶12–¶14, 458 P.3d 569, 575–576 (N. M. Ct. App.
2018). 4 Since Burnham ,
some courts have sought to revive the tag rule for artificial
entities while others argue that doing so would be inconsistentwith International Shoe . Compare First Am. Corp. v. Price Waterhouse LLP , 154 F.3d 16 , 20–21 (CA2 1998), with Martinez v. Aero
Caribbean , 764 F.3d 1062, 1067–1069 (CA9 2014). 5 The majority worries that
the thoughts expressed here threaten to “transfigure our specific
jurisdiction standard as applied to corporations” and “return [us]
to the mid-19th century.” Ante , at 7, n. 2; ante , at 9, n. 3. But it has become a tired trope to
criticize any reference to the Constitution’s original meaning as
(somehow) both radical and antiquated.  Seeking to understand
the Constitution’s original meaning is part of our job.
What’s the majority’s real worry anyway—that corporations might
lose special protections?  The Constitution has always allowed
suits against individuals on any issue in any State where
they set foot. Supra, at 8–9.  Yet the majority
seems to recoil at even entertaining the possibility the
Constitution might tolerate similar results for “nationwide
corporation[s],” whose “business is everywhere.” Ante ,
at 2; ante , at 9, n. 3.