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The article discusses the application by U.S. federal courts of rule 44.1 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure in the litigation of foreign law, including the factors adversely affecting the rule's utilization like the use of expert testimony.

It is black-letter law that in order to recognize and enforce a foreign judgment, the rendering court must have had personal jurisdiction over the defendant. While the principle is clear, it is an open question as to whose law governs the question of personal jurisdiction: that of the rendering court or that of the recognizing court. In other words, is the foreign court's jurisdiction over the defendant governed by foreign law (the law of FI), domestic law (the law ofF2), or some combination thereof? While courts have taken a number of different approaches, it seems that many courts regard foreign law as relevant to the question of whether the foreign court possessed personal jurisdiction over the defendant. In this Article, I argue that U.S. courts should not be looking to foreign law (in whole or in part) to determine whether a foreign court hadjurisdiction over the defendant in the original action. I present five arguments in support of this contention: (1) there is no statutory authority pointing to the application of foreign law; (2) U.S. courts are not well-positioned to apply foreign jurisdictional law; (3) re-examining assertions of jurisdiction under foreign law violates international comity; (4) an examination of foreign law is usually unnecessary because jurisdiction is also assessed according to U.S. standards; and (5) U.S. courts do not do a good job applying foreign jurisdictional law. Instead, I argue that courts should apply American law to assess whether a foreign court was jurisdictionally competent. This, in turn, raises the question: What is "American" law? I maintain that courts should apply broad federal standards of jurisdiction, and not state-based ones, to determine whether the rendering court had personal jurisdiction over the defendant. This Article also looks closely at two particular areas of jurisdiction law that are particularly complicated as they relate to the choice of law issue: submission and notice. With respect to submission, U.S. courts seem to be unclear as to whose law applies in assessing whether a defendant in a foreign action submitted to the jurisdiction of the foreign court. In particular, many U.S. courts defer to the foreign court's interpretations as to whether the acts of the defendant constituted submission. With respect to notice, there is a lack of clarity as to how notice relates to personal jurisdiction in the context of the recognition and enforcement of foreign judgments. Here too, there is confusion as to whose law of notice applies in assessing whether a defendant received adequate notice of the proceeding. Consistent with the argument above, this Article takes the position that U.S. standards, and not foreign ones, should ultimately guide the submission and notice inquiries in the recognition context. Finally, because much of the law in this area is codified in either the 1962 Uniform Foreign Money-Judgments Recognition Act or the 2005 Uniform Foreign-Country Money Judgments Recognition Act, I propose concrete changes to the language of the uniform acts that would address the choice of law problem in the recognition of foreign judgments and would clarify the intersection between notice and personal jurisdiction in the uniform acts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the dynamic incorporation of foreign law in America in relation to the constitutional regulation of U.S. federal lawmaking and the nation's Lacey Act. According to the article, the dynamic incorporation of foreign law involves the delegation of the ongoing authority to create federal law to another polity. The U.S. Constitution and laws imposing criminal liability are mentioned, along with the U.S. Congress' powers and several nondelegation doctrine-related legal cases.

Foreign law has become an increasingly important element of many cases brought before federal courts. Rule 44.1, which controls determinations of foreign law, is intended to make the process for determining foreign law as painless as possible, but like the regime that preceded it, it has become a procedural minefield for those wishing to rely on foreign law, as courts have declined to apply Rule 44.1 when it should be used, either deliberately or due to uncertainty as to its application. This is in large part due to the lack of concrete standards outlined in the rule. This Note examines the standards associated with the rule and their application in the years immediately after its promulgation and concludes that the reliant party's burden of production with respect to foreign law should vary based on whether statutory text is provided. If a statute is available, the courts should be required to undertake a Rule 44.1 analysis, while if a statute is unavailable, the reliant party should bear the burden of producing substantial evidence of foreign law. This standard, elaborated in the text of Rule 44.1, should ensure that as many foreign law determinations as possible can be resolved on the merits. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Foreign law lies at the heart of private international law. After all, a true conflict of law cannot be resolved unless and until the content of foreign law is established. Despite this, the pleading and proof of foreign law remain among the most under-explored topics in Australian private international law. In light of the High Court of Australia's significant change of direction on choice of law since 2000, most notably in cases such as John Pfeiffer Pty Ltd v Rogerson, Regie Nationale des Usines Renault SA v Zhang and Neilson v Overseas Projects Corporation of Victoria Ltd, it is all the more important to answer some of the basic questions about the pleading and proof of foreign law. Who pleads foreign law? What law do they plead? Are they obliged to do so? How do they prove its content? When can local law be applied in the place of foreign law? This article addresses these and related questions with a particular focus on Australian law as it has developed since 2000. It concludes that Australian courts take a more robust and pragmatic approach to these issues than might be supposed. In particular, the so-called presumption of identity is a label that masks a much richer and more complex reality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Discusses a debate over foreign law in Roper v. Simmons in the U.S. Background on the case; Decision of the Supreme Court on the case; Similarities between the case Atkins v. Virginia and the Roper case.

Examines the evolution of a judge-made transformation of Canadian conflict of laws principles specific to the recognition and enforcement of foreign judgments exemplified in the Supreme Court of Canada's ruling in Beals v. Saldanha. Revision of the English formula in relation to the inter-provincial context in the Court's seminal ruling Morgard Investments Ltd. v. DeSavoye; Facts of the Beals case; Rulings of the lower courts.

Discusses the application of the law of foreign countries in the U.S. Requirement for the litigants to plead and prove the content of the law; Regard for the law of sister states; Achievement of a uniform result regardless of where suit is brought.

Addresses the questions, under what circumstances the court of the forum makes a presumption of foreign law, and what presumption it makes. Three possible rules which indicate when the court of the forum will shift the burden of going forward with evidence as to the foreign law upon the party not having the burden of proof of the whole issue of which the foreign law is a part; Cases which make plain the way courts recognize which of the American and European states have fundamentally the common-law system and those which have not.

Presents Federal and Supreme Court decisions and rulings on various cases pertaining to bankruptcy, disclosure of medical records, decisions without opinions, and foreign law.