Professor Dodge files Supreme Court amicus brief on international comity abstention

On Oct. 29, Professor William S. Dodge filed an amicus brief at the U.S. Supreme Court in Hungary v. Simon and Germany v. Philipp, two cases based on takings of property in connection with the Holocaust brought under the expropriation exception of the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act. The brief, co-written with Professor Maggie Gardner (Cornell), argues that the Supreme Court should not adopt the doctrine of international comity abstention urged by Hungary, Germany, and the United States, which is both new and highly discretionary, and that existing doctrines are sufficient to address comity concerns. (The brief also cites an article published earlier this year in the UC Davis Law Review.)

Professor Dodge is Martin Luther King Jr. Professor of Law and John D. Ayer Chair in Business Law at UC Davis School of Law. He is a leading expert on international law, international transactions, and international dispute resolution, who served as Counselor on International Law to the Legal Adviser at the U.S. Department of State from 2011 to 2012 and as a reporter for the American Law Institute’s Restatement (Fourth) of Foreign Relations Law from 2012 to 2018. Professor Dodge is a co-author of the casebook Transnational Business Problems and a co-editor of International Law in the U.S. Supreme Court: Continuity and Change, which won the American Society of International Law’s 2012 certificate of merit. He has authored more than 60 other publications in books and law reviews.