Phillips v. Amoco Trinidad Oil Co., 78-2672

• Decision Date: 19 November 1980
• Docket Number: No. 78-2672,78-2672
• Citation: 632 F.2d 82
• Parties: Bethilda Betty PHILLIPS, Widow and Personal Representative of Walter Phillips, deceased, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. AMOCO TRINIDAD OIL COMPANY, and Santa Fe Drilling Company, Defendants-Appellees.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Ninth Circuit

Page 82

632 F.2d 82

Bethilda Betty PHILLIPS, Widow and Personal Representative of Walter Phillips, deceased, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. AMOCO TRINIDAD OIL COMPANY, and Santa Fe Drilling Company Defendants-Appellees.

No. 78-2672.

United States Court of Appeals Ninth Circuit.

Argued and Submitted May 5, 1980.

Decided Sept. 29, 1980.

Rehearing Denied Nov. 19, 1980.

Aram B. G. Adler, Philadelphia, Pa., argued for plaintiff-appellant; Bodle, Fogel Julber, Reinhardt & Rothschild, Los Angeles, Cal., on brief.

Sheldon A. Gebb, Los Angeles, Cal., Winston E. Rice, Phelps, Dunbar, Marks, Claverie & Sims, New Orleans, La., argued for defendants-appellees; Bill E. Schroeder, Los Angeles, Cal., on brief.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Central District of California.

Before WALLACE and SCHROEDER, Circuit Judges, and CORDOVA, ^* District Judge.

WALLACE, Circuit Judge:

Plaintiffs appeal from a district court determination that the law of Trinidad, rather than United States maritime law, applies to two wrongful death actions and 12 personal injury actions filed on behalf of citizens and domiciliaries of Trinidad against Amoco Trinidad Oil Co. (Amoco Trinidad) and Santa Fe Drilling Co. (Santa Fe). The district court certified its order for interlocutory appeal pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1292(b), and we granted plaintiffs' petition for permission to appeal. Finding that the district court properly applied controlling choice-of-law principles, we affirm.

I.

The accident giving rise to this litigation occurred on December 5, 1973, during the course of exploratory drilling operations with the drilling rig Mariner I. Plaintiffs brought their claims pursuant to the Jones Act, 46 U.S.C. § 688.

Mariner I is a special-purpose, submersible drilling vessel which must be towed to its drilling site. The rig was documented under the laws of the United States and flew an American flag. It was also licensed to operate in Trinidad waters by the government of that nation. At the time of the accident, Mariner I was drilling under contract to Amoco Trinidad, 10.5 miles from the Trinidad coast, in that nation's territorial waters. Indeed, Mariner I worked exclusively offshore of Trinidad from February 1970 to March 1976.

Santa Fe owns and operates Mariner I. It is an American-based corporation with headquarters in Orange, California. Although the Orange headquarters monitored and maintained some control of the operation of Mariner I, day-to-day operational decisions were made by Santa Fe staff in Trinidad. Plaintiffs also allege that Amoco Trinidad is an owner of Mariner I. Amoco Trinidad is a Delaware corporation, with its principal offices and places of business in Trinidad. The president of Amoco Trinidad resides in Trinidad, where all operational decisions are made.

Eleven of the injured workers were Santa Fe employees. The remaining three were employed by Schlumberger Trinidad, Inc., a Panamanian corporation, not party to this litigation. Plaintiffs are all citizens and domiciliaries of Trinidad. The Santa Fe employees were hired pursuant to a collective bargaining agreement between Santa Fe and the local Trinidad Oil Field Workers Union. The Trinidad government controlled the make-up of Mariner I's work force by limiting the number of work permits for non-Trinidad nationals. A Trinidad statute directs that the civil law of Trinidad applies to any acts or omissions occurring in the course of the exploration or exploitation of its continental shelf.

II.

The question presented is whether the district court correctly determined that the law of Trinidad, rather than the Jones Act, applies to this case. This is a question of law subject to our de novo review.

Plaintiffs contend that the Jones Act applies whenever a claimant can show that he is a "seaman" as defined by the statute. 46 U.S.C. § 688. ¹ Read literally, the Act would provide that an injured seaman of any nationality could maintain an action against any party over whom he could gain personal jurisdiction. But courts have never applied the Jones Act as broadly as a literal reading of it would require. The Supreme Court has indicated that the Jones Act applies "only to areas and transactions in which American law would be considered operative under prevalent doctrines of international law." Lauritzen v. Larsen, 345 U.S. 571, 577, 73 S.Ct. 921, 926, 97 L.Ed. 1254 (1953). Thus, we must first determine, by the application of relevant choice-of-law criteria, whether the Jones Act applies in the particular factual setting of this case. See Romero v. International Terminal Operating Co., 358 U.S. 354, 382, 79 S.Ct. 468, 485, 3 L.Ed.2d 368 (1959); Lauritzen v. Larsen, supra, 345 U.S. at 576-83, 73 S.Ct. at 925-928; Chirinos de Alvarez v. Creole Petroleum Corp., 613 F.2d 1240, 1245-46 (3d Cir. 1980); Moncada v. Lemuria Shipping Corp., 491 F.2d 470, 472 (2d Cir.), cert. denied, 417 U.S. 947, 94 S.Ct. 3072, 41 L.Ed.2d 667 (1974).

A. Lauritzen and Rhoditis

The relevant considerations for maritime choice-of-law decisions were set forth and applied in Lauritzen v. Larsen, supra, 345 U.S. 571, 73 S.Ct. 921, 97 L.Ed. 1254, and Hellenic Lines, Ltd. v. Rhoditis, 398 U.S. 306, 90 S.Ct. 1731, 26 L.Ed.2d 252 (1970). In Lauritzen, the Supreme Court enumerated seven factors that bear on whether the Jones Act applies: (1) the place of the wrongful act; (2) the law of the flag; (3) the allegiance or domicile of the injured; (4) the allegiance of the defendant shipowner; (5) the place of contract; (6) the inaccessibility of the foreign forum; and (7) the law of the forum. Lauritzen taught that the appropriate law to apply would be determined by "ascertaining and valuing (the enumerated) points of contact between the transaction and the states or governments whose competing laws are involved." 345 U.S. at 582, 73 S.Ct. at 928.

As the only factor pointing toward the application of American law in Lauritzen was the place where the plaintiff's maritime contract was signed, it was clear that the Jones Act did not apply. Nevertheless, the Court provided some general guidelines to consider in the "valuing" and "weighing" of the various factors. Id. Among other things, the Court in Lauritzen stressed that the law of the flag is generally of cardinal importance in maritime choice-of-law decisions, id. at 584-86, 73 S.Ct. at 929-930, and it suggested that the last two enumerated factors should be given very little weight. Id. at 589-91, 73 S.Ct. at 931-932.

In Hellenic Lines, Ltd. v. Rhoditis, supra, 398 U.S. 306, 90 S.Ct. 1731, 26 L.Ed.2d 252, the Supreme Court found that the Jones Act applied to a Greek seaman's claim, although most of the Lauritzen factors, including the law of the flag, pointed toward the application of foreign law. ² Rhoditis not only stressed that "(t)he Lauritzen test . . . is not a mechanical one," 398 U.S. at 308, 90 S.Ct. at 1733, but found that "the list of seven factors in Lauritzen was not intended as exhaustive." Id. at 309, 90 S.Ct. at 1734. Announcing an additional "base of operations" test, the Court found that the connection between this country and the subject ship's commercial and shipping operations was substantial enough to warrant application of the Jones Act. Id. at 309-310, 90 S.Ct. at 1734-1735.

B. The Nature of the Test

The parties before us disagree on the weight to be accorded the various relevant connections between the United States and the maritime operations of Mariner I. Some of this disagreement stems from contrasting interpretations of Lauritzen and Rhoditis.

The parties agree that the choice-of-law test is not a mechanical one and that the factors are not necessarily accorded equal weight. Lauritzen v. Larsen, supra, 345 U.S. at 582, 73 S.Ct at 928; Hellenic Lines, Ltd. v. Rhoditis, supra, 398 U.S. at 308-09, 90 S.Ct. at 1733-1734. Courts have also indicated that particular factors will merit varying degrees of consideration from case to case. See Moncada v. Lemuria Shipping Corp., supra, 491 F.2d at 472; House v. Santa Fe Int'l Corp., 1978 A.M.C. 1899, 1902 (S.D.Tex.1978). Factors that have little significance in one factual setting may warrant greater weight in another.

Plaintiffs place great weight on the statement in Rhoditis that "(t)he significance of one or more factors must be considered in light of the national interest served by the assertion of Jones Act jurisdiction." 398 U.S. at 309, 90 S.Ct. at 1734 (footnote omitted). We agree that the Lauritzen factors should be applied with sensitivity to the national interest that may be served by the assertion of American maritime law in a particular case. Yet we do not read Rhoditis as undercutting the equally valid teaching of Romero v. International Terminal Operating Co., supra, that the Lauritzen factors should be applied "with due recognition of our self-regarding respect for the relevant interests of foreign nations . . . ." 358 U.S. at 382-83, 79 S.Ct. at 486. ³ See also Lauritzen v. Larsen supra, 345 U.S. at 582, 73 S.Ct. at 928; DeMateos v. Texaco, Inc., 562 F.2d 895, 901 (3d Cir. 1977), cert. denied, 435 U.S. 904, 98 S.Ct. 1449, 55 L.Ed.2d 494 (1978).

The plaintiffs' apparent belief that the crux of choice-of-law analysis is the abject furtherance of American interests leads them to urge an unrealistic interpretation of language in certain Second Circuit decisions. The Second Circuit has stated that "each factor is to be 'weighed' and 'evaluated' only to the end that, after each factor has been given consideration, a rational and satisfactory conclusion may be arrived at on the question of whether all the factors present add up to the necessary substantiality." Bartholomew v. Universe Tankships, Inc., 263 F.2d 437, 441 (2d. Cir.), cert. denied, 359 U.S. 1000, 79 S.Ct. 1138, 3 L.Ed.2d 1030 (1959), quoted in Hellenic Lines, Ltd. v. Rhoditis, supra, 398 U.S. at 309 n. 4, 90 S.Ct. at 1734. Under this "substantiality" test, the "task is not to weigh or balance...