Obligatory Forum Court Statute

Obligatory Forum Court Statute in Maritime Law

Note: There is more information on maritime/admiralty law here.

The following is a definition of Obligatory Forum Court Statute, produced by Tetley, in the context of admiralty law: In the conflict of laws, an obligatory forum court statute is a national statute or international convention which is compulsorily applicable whenever any case on the subject of that statute or convention is heard in the courts of the State in question. Most legal authors do not distinguish obligatory forum court statutes from public order (see this maritime law term in this legal dictionary) or mandatory rules (see this maritime law term in this legal dictionary) of the forum, but such statutes are distinguishable from both those concepts, in that they are obligatorily applied by the forum court, whenever a case involving their subject matter is tried in such a court, rather than because of any connecting factor (contact) linking the case to the law of that forum (State). An example of this type of statute is the United Kingdom’s Merchant Shipping Act 1995, U.K. 1995 c. 21, at sect. 185(1) and Schedule 7 Part I art. 15, which provisions give effect in the U.K. to the Limitation Convention 1976 (see this maritime law term in this legal dictionary) and require the Convention to be applied whenever limitation proceedings are instituted before the courts of any State party to the Convention, thereby making the Convention compulsorily applicable to any such proceedings taken in any U.K. court. Obligatory forum court statutes are rare. They have no place in any system of international law and can be overcome in jurisdictions which have adopted the principle of forum non conveniens (see this maritime law term in this legal dictionary). See Tetley, Int’l. C. of L., 1994 at pp. 102-103, 131-132, 561; Tetley, Int’l. M. & A. L., 2003 at p. 314.