American Export Lines, Inc. v. Alvez (1979)
- Docket
- 79-1
- Decided
- 1979-01-01
Summary
Question: May Alvez’s wife sue American Export Lines, Inc. for loss of consortium, as a result of AELI’s negligence and the unseaworthiness of the USS Export Builder , under federal maritime law? Conclusion: Yes. In a 6-3 decision with two concurrences, Justice William Brennan held that maritime law authorizes Juanita Alvez to maintain an action for damages against AELI resulting from the loss of her husband’s society. He rejected AELI’s argument that the Jones Act and DOHSA represented Congress’ intention to preclude actions for loss of consortium or society. He noted that DOHSA centered on relief for fatal injuries on the high seas, not nonfatal injuries within terrestrial waters, and that the Jones Act does not exhaustively regulate the claims of longshoremen or seamen. Justice Brennan agreed with the lower courts that the Court’s recent maritime law decisions eroded the justification for denying claims used in Igneri . He also pointed to the contemporary state of the law, where a clear majority of states permitted a wife to recover damages for loss of consortium from personal injuries to her husband. Justice Lewis Powell concurred, writing that there was no rational basis for drawing a distinction between fatal and nonfatal injuries in loss of consortium cases. Justice Thurgood Marshall, joined by Justices Potter Stewart and William Rehnquist, dissented. He questioned the majority’s assumption that the federal question at hand would necessarily survive AELI’s appeals in state court. He warned against the practice of granting review to non-final lower court orders, and recommended denying certiorari to such cases in the future.