## Facts

- Francisco Romero, a Spanish seaman, served aboard the S.S. Guadalupe, a Spanish-flag vessel owned by a Spanish corporation, for a voyage that began and ended in Spain.
- While the vessel was docked in Hoboken, New Jersey, Romero was seriously injured on deck when struck by a cable during cargo-related operations.
- A New York husbanding agent arranged, by oral contracts, for a stevedore and a carpentry contractor to perform work aboard the vessel in Hoboken.
- Romero sued on the law side of federal district court to obtain a jury trial, asserting a Jones Act negligence claim and general maritime claims (including unseaworthiness and maintenance and cure) against the shipowner and agent, and maritime negligence claims against the stevedore and carpentry contractor.
- The district court dismissed the action; the court of appeals affirmed; the Supreme Court reviewed.

## Issues

1. Whether alleging a Jones Act claim suffices to invoke federal jurisdiction even if the Act ultimately provides no substantive remedy on the facts alleged.
2. Whether 28 U.S.C. § 1331 provides law-side federal-question jurisdiction over claims based solely on general maritime law.
3. Whether the district court could hear general maritime claims against the foreign shipowner as pendent to the Jones Act claim.
4. Whether 28 U.S.C. § 1332 supplies diversity jurisdiction for general maritime negligence claims against domestic corporate defendants.
5. Whether the Jones Act or United States general maritime law applies to a foreign seaman’s claims against a foreign shipowner arising from an injury in a United States port.

## Decision

- The Supreme Court vacated the judgment and remanded for further proceedings.
- The Court held that Jones Act jurisdiction was adequately alleged; the lower court erred by treating failure on the merits as lack of jurisdiction.
- The Court held § 1331 does not grant law-side jurisdiction over claims resting only on general maritime law.
- The Court held the district court had pendent jurisdiction, attached to the Jones Act claim, to consider related general maritime claims against the foreign shipowner.
- The Court held there was diversity jurisdiction under § 1332 over general maritime negligence claims against the domestic corporate defendants.
- On choice of law, the Court held neither the Jones Act nor United States general maritime law governed Romero’s claims against the foreign shipowner given the predominance of foreign contacts.
- The Court approved dismissal of unseaworthiness and maintenance-and-cure claims against the husbanding agent based on the trial court’s factual findings.
- The Court remanded for consideration of the negligence claims against the domestic corporate defendants.

## Legal Principles

- A complaint’s colorable invocation of a federal statute (such as the Jones Act) generally supports subject-matter jurisdiction, even if the claim fails on the merits.
- General maritime law claims do not “arise under” the Constitution or laws of the United States within the meaning of 28 U.S.C. § 1331 when brought on the law side.
- Admiralty and maritime jurisdiction is a distinct jurisdictional grant; law-side adjudication of maritime claims requires an independent basis such as diversity or a statutory cause of action.
- Federal courts may exercise pendent jurisdiction over closely related nonstatutory maritime claims when anchored to a properly invoked federal statutory claim.
- Diversity jurisdiction can support law-side maritime tort claims against diverse defendants, including suits by an alien against domestic corporations.
- For a foreign seaman’s claims against a foreign shipowner, choice of law turns on factors including the law of the flag, the parties’ allegiance, the place of contract, and the center of the employment relationship; predominant foreign contacts can defeat application of the Jones Act and United States maritime law.

## Conclusion

The Court clarified that general maritime law does not itself create § 1331 federal-question jurisdiction on the law side, distinguished jurisdiction from the existence of a substantive Jones Act remedy, applied choice-of-law limits to bar Jones Act and United States maritime law claims against a foreign shipowner on largely foreign facts, and remanded to allow negligence claims against diverse domestic defendants to proceed.


Romero v. Int'l Terminal Operating Co., 358 U.S. 354 (1959)