The “Complete Diversity” Requirement for Federal Jurisdiction: Time to Correct this 210-Year-Old Error

Abstract

As a Yale Law professor, I have been teaching introductory civil procedure for over 30 years. Diversity jurisdiction as interpreted by the US Supreme Court never made sense; even first-year law students could see that. The only plausible purpose for diversity jurisdiction in the federal courts is to avoid the possibility of a “home court advantage” for in-state litigants. But how can the default rule requiring complete diversity ever achieve that result? The prevailing rule mandating complete diversity requires that no plaintiff and no defendant are from the same state in order to get into federal court, whereas “minimal diversity” would provide that it is enough for federal jurisdiction if any parties on opposite sides of the “v.” are from different states.