First Page
759
Last Page
788
Document Type
Comment
Abstract
There is a longstanding tension in the Court’s treatment of non-removal statutes and door-closing penalties. On the one hand, the Court has held non-removal statutes—business registration statutes that condition a foreign corporation’s license on that corporation’s right to remove cases brought against it to federal court—pose an unconstitutional limit on federal court access. On the other, the Court has extended door-closing penalties statutes prohibiting unregistered foreign corporations from initiating an action in the forum state—to federal courts sitting in diversity. This Article surveys how the Court arrived at this puzzling result. It does so by analyzing each line of cases before suggesting that the constitutionality of non-removal and door-closing rise and fall together. For if the Constitution protects federal court access by prohibiting non-removal statutes, the same should be true of door-closing penalties. As a result, this Article argues the Court veered off course when it held door-closing penalties apply to federal courts. By reconciling this tension, the Court would not only find doctrinal consistency but also hush those concerns surrounding consent to general jurisdiction via registration statute.
Recommended Citation
Isaac Zwerling,
Open and Shut: Non-Removal Statutesand Door-Closing Penalties,
53 Pepp. L. Rev.
759
(2026)
Available at:
https://digitalcommons.pepperdine.edu/plr/vol53/iss4/5
Included in
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