For the past two decades, the U.S. Supreme Court has been slowly weakening the Alien Tort Statute (ATS), a key human rights law that allows foreign nationals to sue persons or entities in civil court for harms resulting from violations of international law. The court’s recent ruling in Cisco Systems, Inc. v. Doe I dealt the law a final blow, foreclosing—absent new legislation by Congress—any future ability by plaintiffs to use the law to hold technology companies accountable for aiding and abetting human rights abuses. EFF filed multiple amicus briefs in the case, including most recently in the Supreme Court.
Case file: https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/25pdf/24-856_kjfm.pdf
Once again, when the legal system descends into farce, vigilantism becomes more appealing. The rich can twist the law as much as they want, but they’re rolling the dice that they’ll have a surprise plumber visit.
MLK wasn’t playing, “when you make peaceful change impossible, you make violent revolution inevitable.”
We’re getting pretty close again.
The ATS was passed by the very first Congress in 1789
#originalism
