Recognition of Judgments

Question 1

What provision of the constitution dictates when a court should recognize a sister state court’s judgment?

Answer 1

The full faith and credit clause.

Question 2

What needs to be the case in order to satisfy the full-faith and credit clause?

Answer 2

1. The rendering state must have had jurisdiction over the parties
2. The judgment by the rendering state must have been on the merits
3. The judgment entered by the rendering court must have been a final judgment

— all three evaluated using the laws of the rendering state.

Question 3

When can the jurisdiction requirement not be argued?

Answer 3

When the issue of jurisdiction was fully and fairly litigated, and is therefore entitled to full faith and credit itself.

Question 4

What kinds of judgments are considered judgments on the merits even though they weren’t litigated?

Answer 4

1. Default judgments

2. Consent judgments

Question 5

What are the defenses to the full faith and credit clause?

Answer 5

1. Penal judgment: penal judgments (the plaintiff was the state) are not entitled to full faith and credit.
2. Extrinsic fraud: a judgment obtained during fraud that occurred during the regular course of the proceedings leading to the judgment is not entitled to full faith and credit.

Question 6

How does a US court decide whether a foreign court’s judgment should be recognized?

Answer 6

The source of the obligation to recognize is either (i) a treaty or (ii) comity.

Question 7

How does comity work?

Answer 7

Under the principal of comity, a recognizing court will exercise discretion to decide whether the foreign judgment should be recognized.

The court will also ask (i) whether the foreign court had jurisdiction and (ii) whether the procedures in the foreign court were fair.