Court won't block US lawsuit by apartheid victims
WASHINGTON (AP) - May 12, 2008 The result is that a lawsuit accusing some prominent companies
of violating international law by assisting South Africa's former
apartheid government will go forward.
The court's hands were tied by federal laws that require at
least six justices to hear any case before them.
Short of the required number by one, the court took the only
path available to it and upheld an appeals court ruling allowing
the suit to proceed.
The justices have ties to Bank of America, Bristol-Myers Squibb,
Colgate-Palmolive, Credit Suisse, Exxon Mobil, Hewlett-Packard, IBM
and Nestle, among nearly three dozen companies that asked the high
court to step in.
The justices' latest financial disclosures show:
-Chief Justice John Roberts owned Hewlett-Packard stock.
-Justice Stephen Breyer owned stock in Colgate-Palmolive, Bank
of America, IBM and Nestle.
-Justice Samuel Alito holds shares in Exxon Mobil, which caused
him to sit out the still-pending dispute over the $2.5 billion
punitive damages award for the Exxon Valdez disaster. Alito also
owns Bristol-Myers Squibb.
Justice Anthony Kennedy does not hold stock in any affected
company, but his son, Gregory, is a managing director at Credit
Suisse. He sat out a case last term involving the investment bank.
Business groups, the Bush administration and the current South
African government also sought the high court's intervention. They
argued that the lawsuit is damaging international relations,
threatening to hurt South Africa's economic development and
punishing the companies using a fuzzy concept of aiding violations
of international law.
Last year's ruling by the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in
New York "allows an unprecedented and sprawling lawsuit to move
forward and represents a dramatic expansion of U.S. law," the
administration said in court papers.
Lawyers for the South Africans bringing the complaint said it
was premature for the Supreme Court to get involved. The lawyers
said they plan to narrow their complaint, perhaps omitting some
corporations and showing more clearly how the companies assisted
the apartheid government.
The case involves the Alien Tort Claims Act, an 18th-century law
that allows foreigners to sue in U.S. courts over international law
violations. It was originally intended to allow foreigners to have
a place to make claims against pirates, but the law has been
increasingly used in the last 15 years to sue corporations for
their alleged involvement in human rights abuses overseas.
The lawsuit raises sticky questions about U.S. policy toward
governments accused of repression. For example, the administration
said the government may impose targeted sanctions while still
allowing commerce in order to encourage reform. The suit could
undermine that policy.
The case is American Isuzu Motors v. Ntsebeza, 07-919.