News[JURIST] In a second opinion handed down Tuesday morning, the US Supreme Court held that federal law governs maritime contracts when the dispute is not inherently local, that a broadly written clause limiting liability in a bill of lading can be extended to cover multiple forms of transportation, and that when an intermediary contracts with a carrier to transport goods, the cargo owner’s recovery against the carrier is limited by the liability limitation to which the intermediary and carrier agreed. The case is Norfolk Southern Railway v. Kirby (case backgrounder from Duke Law School). Cornell's Legal Information Institute has posted the unanimous opinion per Justice O'Connor.
