The Court properly holds that the personal-jurisdiction provisions of the Promoting Security and Justice for Victims of Terrorism Act (PSJVTA), §903, 133 Stat. 3082–3085, 18 U. S. C. §§ 2333, 2334, do not violate respondents' claimed rights under the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment. See ante, at 18–25. In reaching this conclusion, the majority recognizes that the Fourteenth Amendment's “minimum contacts standard” does not apply to the Fifth Amendment's Due Process Clause. Ante, at 16. But, rather than decide what standard does apply, the Court holds only that Page Proof Pending Publication the Fifth Amendment at least permits a statute such as the PSJVTA that “ties federal jurisdiction to conduct closely related to the United States that implicates important foreign policy concerns.” Ante, at 18. The Court leaves for another day the task of defning “the Fifth Amendment's outer limits on the territorial jurisdiction of federal courts.” Ante, at 19. I would take a different approach. When interpreting constitutional provisions, we must look to “the text of the Constitution” as well as “historical evidence from the framing” that can illuminate “the intent of those who drafted and ratifed it.” McIntyre v. Ohio Elections Comm'n, 514 U. S. 334, 370 (1995) (Thomas, J., concurring in judgment). The critical question in these cases is what boundaries the Fifth Amendment's due process guarantee, as originally understood, places on the Federal Government's power to extend personal jurisdiction over respondents. Historical evidence demonstrates that the answer is “none.” “Because the majority has adopted an analysis that is largely unconnected to the Constitution's text and history, I concur only in the judgment.” Id., at 371.
I
“We start with the text of the Fifth Amendment” and interpret its provisions in light of how they were “ `understood in 1791.' ” Gamble v. United States, 587 U. S. 678, 683 (2019); see also McIntyre, 514 U. S., at 370–371 (opinion of Thomas, J.). The Fifth Amendment's Due Process Clause provides that “[n]o person” shall “be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law.” Thus, to show that the PSJVTA's jurisdictional provisions run afoul of the Fifth Amendment's due process protections, respondents must establish both that they are “person[s]” protected by the Fifth Amendment and that the PSJVTA transgresses their due process rights. These requirements in turn raise two threshold issues: whether respondents enjoy constitutional rights in the frst place, and what “due process of law” requires. While my conclusions as to both threshold issues Page Proof Pending Publication remain tentative, there are strong reasons to think that each poses an independently fatal problem for respondents. At a minimum, however, I would conclude today that the PSJVTA's jurisdictional provisions do not violate any plausible understanding of due process.
A
I am skeptical that entities such as the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) and the Palestinian Authority (PA) enjoy any constitutional rights at all, let alone qualify as “person[s]” for purposes of the Fifth Amendment.
The PLO and the PA are foreign bodies that are not recognized as sovereign by the United States, but that nevertheless carry out governmental functions. Ante, at 6. Although the Federal Government does not take a position on the question whether such foreign nonsovereign governmental bodies have constitutional rights, Tr. of Oral Arg. 43–45, the Executive Branch has for decades endorsed principles that suggest that the Constitution does not protect these types of entities.
Begin with the Executive's approach to “the nature of foreign sovereigns.” Constitutionality of Closing the Palestine Information Offce, an Affliate of the Palestine Liberation Org., 11 Op. OLC 104, 106 (1987). To be sure, the United States does not recognize respondents as sovereign states, ante, at 6, but the Executive's view of foreign nations' constitutional rights nevertheless may shed light on respondents' assertion of constitutional rights here. Foreign sovereigns, the Offce of Legal Counsel has explained, each “interac[t] with the United States as a foreign, co-equal sovereign.” 11 Op. OLC, at 106. “[T]he United States interacts with foreign states not within the constitutional system, but as a juridical equal, on the level of international law and diplomacy.” Id., at 107. It follows that no sovereign can be Page Proof Pending Publication “ `amenable,' or subject to the other,” ibid., for such an arrangement would violate the precept that “the body of the nation, the State, remains absolutely free,” E. de Vattel, The Law of Nations, Preliminaries, § 4, p. lv (J. Chitty ed. 1854).1 Thus, “[a] foreign nation, . . . unlike a foreign national, does not have rights under the Fifth Amendment.” Presidential Authority To Settle the Iranian Crisis, 4A Op. OLC 248, 260, n. 9 (1980).
The Executive Branch has reached the same conclusion regarding domestic nonsovereign governing bodies, such as United States Territories. See Mutual Consent Provisions in the Guam Commonwealth Legislation, 1994 WL 16193765, *5 (OLC, July 28, 1994) (“non-state areas” are “governmental bodies” that “are not protected by the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment”). “Territories are but political subdivisions of the outlying dominion of the United States” and thus relate to the Federal Government similarly to the way in which municipalities relate “to the respective States.” National Bank v. County of Yankton, 101 U. S. 129, 133 (1880). Given that a municipality is “created by a state for the better ordering of government,” and thus has “no privileges or immunities under the federal constitution which it may invoke in opposition to the will of its creator,” Williams v. Mayor of Baltimore, 289 U. S. 36, 40 (1933); see also New ark v. New Jersey, 262 U. S. 192, 196 (1923), the Executive's conclusion that the same logic should apply to Territories is reasonable. Accord, e. g., Puerto Rico Public Housing Admin. v. United States Dept. of Housing and Urban Devel opment, 59 F. Supp. 2d 310, 325 (PR 1999) (instrumentalities 1Vattel was “widely consulted by the constitutional generation in the United States,” and was “invariably invoked as authoritative on matters of international law by the likes of Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, James Wilson, Edmund Randolph, Thomas Jefferson, John Marshall, Joseph Story and James Kent, among others.” M. Ramsey, Executive Agreements and the (Non)Treaty Power, 77 N. C. L. Rev. 133, 169–170 (1998) (internal quotation marks omitted).
Page Proof Pending Publication of the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico are “ `non-persons' ” for purposes of constitutional claims).
Assuming that the Executive Branch is correct that neither foreign sovereign governments nor domestic nonsovereign Territories enjoy constitutional rights, it is unclear why the Constitution would treat foreign nonsovereign governmental entities such as respondents differently. In the Executive's own words, the PLO is at bottom “a foreign political entity” that “ `lies outside the structure of the union.' ” 11 Op. OLC, at 107 (quoting Principality of Monaco v. Missis sippi, 292 U. S. 313, 330 (1934)). Neither it nor the PA has taken any “general obligation to abide by the constitutional norms to which the federal government and the several states are subject, nor are there any effective means to place [them] on parity with the United States or the states for purposes of enforcement of particular norms.” 11 Op. OLC, at 107 (internal quotation marks omitted). It would seem to follow that neither entity enjoys constitutional protections. In addition to the conclusions of the Executive Branch, decisions from this Court further suggest that entities like respondents may not be “person[s]” protected by the Fifth Amendment. In South Carolina v. Katzenbach, 383 U. S. 301, 323 (1966), the Court held that “[t]he word `person' in the context of the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment cannot, by any reasonable mode of interpretation, be expanded to encompass the States of the Union.” Decades later, the Court cited Katzenbach to suggest that “a foreign state” might not be “a `person' for purposes of the Due Process Clause.” Republic of Argentina v. Weltover, Inc., 504 U. S. 607, 619 (1992).
“Since Weltover, the consensus of circuit courts has followed the Supreme Court's lead and defnitively held that foreign states are not entitled to the protections of the Due Process Clause.” CC/Devas (Mauritius) Ltd. v. Antrix Corp., 91 F. 4th 1340, 1350 (CA9 2024) (Bumatay, J., dissenting from denial of rehearing en banc). The D. C. Circuit Page Proof Pending Publication thoroughly analyzed the issue in Price v. Socialist People's Libyan Arab Jamahiriya, 294 F. 3d 82 (2002). Compared to foreign nations, which are “entirely alien to our constitutional system,” the court explained, domestic States “derive important benefts and must abide by signifcant limitations.” Id., at 96. It would therefore be “highly incongruous to afford greater Fifth Amendment rights to foreign nations.” Ibid. At least two other Circuits have reached the same conclusion. See Frontera Resources Azerbaijan Corp.
v. State Oil Co. of Azerbaijan Republic, 582 F. 3d 393, 399 (CA2 2009) (“If the States, as sovereigns that are part of the Union, cannot `avail themselves of the fundamental safeguards of the Due Process Clause,' we do not see why foreign states, as sovereigns wholly outside the Union, should be in a more favored position” (citation omitted)); Abelesz v. Magyar Nemzeti Bank, 692 F. 3d 661, 694 (CA7 2012) (similar).
These courts' and the Executive's determinations that foreign sovereigns do not fall within the “person[s]” protected by the Fifth Amendment's Due Process Clause seem very likely correct, and it is diffcult to see why the Constitution would afford better treatment to foreign nonsovereign governmental entities. To conclude otherwise would imply that foreign governmental entities may receive greater constitutional protections by engaging in conduct that leads the United States to refuse to recognize their sovereignty. I seriously doubt that the Constitution compels such a result. As the Offce of Legal Counsel concluded, “[i]t would be anomalous if the Executive's decision to withhold recognition from a foreign political entity . . . invested that entity with rights greater than those enjoyed by friendly sovereigns present in the United States.” 11 Op. OLC, at 120, n. 7.
Nevertheless, some lower courts have concluded that the Constitution treats nonsovereign foreign governing bodies Page Proof Pending Publication like respondents more favorably than it treats recognized sovereigns, States, Territories, and municipalities. In Liv nat v. Palestinian Authority, 851 F. 3d 45, 52 (2017), for example, the D. C. Circuit held that the Due Process Clause applies to the PA and the PLO, distinguishing Price as “appl[ying] to sovereigns alone.” Because neither the PA nor the PLO are “ `recognized by the United States government as sovereigns,' ” the court reasoned, they are therefore “protected by the Due Process Clause.” 851 F. 3d, at 52.
The D. C. Circuit's opinion could be read to embrace a dichotomy in which entities are either nonsovereigns, which enjoy constitutional rights, or sovereigns, which do not. See ibid.; accord, Waldman v. Palestine Liberation Org., 835 F. 3d 317, 329 (CA2 2016) (noting that “sovereign states are not entitled to due process protection,” but rejecting the argument that respondents lack such protection because “neither the PLO nor the PA is recognized by the United States as a sovereign state”). Respondents rely on that theory here, arguing that a constitutional “binary” applies to the question whether an entity is a “person” under the Fifth Amendment: An entity either is “a person for purposes of the Due Process Clause,” or it is “a sovereign state”; there is no “no-man's-land” in which the entity is “neither a sovereign state nor a person.” Tr. of Oral Arg. 91.
While I agree with a “binary” framework insofar as the Due Process Clause either applies to respondents or it does not, I do not see how sovereignty supplies the dividing line. It is uncontroversial that entities such as municipalities and United States Territories are not sovereigns. See County of Yankton, 101 U. S., at 133; Mutual Consent Provisions in the Guam Commonwealth Legislation, 1994 WL 16193765, *5. Under respondents' framework, this nonsovereign character would seem to compel the conclusion that municipalities and Territories thus must be “person[s]” with constitutional rights. For reasons already discussed, see supra, at 28–29, this result is dubious, see Williams, 289 U. S., at 40 Page Proof Pending Publication (municipalities have “no privileges or immunities under the federal constitution which it may invoke in opposition to the will of its creator”); accord, e. g., East St. Louis v. Circuit Ct. for Twentieth Jud. Cir., St. Clair Cty., 986 F. 2d 1142, 1144 (CA7 1993) (“Municipalities . . . are not `persons' within the meaning of the Due Process Clause”). Further, assuming the Court was correct to conclude that the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment does not “encompass the States of the Union,” Katzenbach, 383 U. S., at 323, it is rather odd to think that the Constitution would provide greater constitutional rights to Territories or the political subdivisions of States than to the States themselves.
Neither the private petitioners nor the Government pressed the argument that the Constitution does not protect respondents at all, so we should not resolve the cases on that basis. See, e. g., H. Proctor, “Will the Meaning of the Second Amendment Change . . . ?”: Party Presentation and Stare Decisis in Text-and-History Cases, 98 N. Y. U. L. Rev. 453, 463, n. 70 (2023) (cautioning against courts attempting to “correc[t] for defciencies in party presentation”). But, the question whether entities like respondents receive any constitutional protection is antecedent to whatever constitutional arguments they might make, and I am hopeful that in an appropriate case parties will brief and the Court will address this issue.2 2One amicus raises the argument that “certain governmental entities, including `foreign states,' ” are not “ `person[s]' ” under the original meaning of the Fifth Amendment. Brief for Chamber of Commerce of the United States of America as Amicus Curiae 6; see also, e. g., A. Scalia & B. Garner, Reading Law 273 (2012) (“[T]he word person traditionally excludes the sovereign”). This textual argument has generated scholarly debate. See, e. g., Brief for Professor Ingrid (Wuerth) Brunk as Amicus Curiae in CC/Devas (Mauritius) Ltd. v. Antrix Corp., O. T. 2024, No. 23– 1201 etc., pp. 3–4 (arguing that, at the time of ratifcation, “the word `person' was routinely used to describe states”).
Page Proof Pending Publication
B
Even assuming that the PLO and the PA are “person[s]” protected by the Fifth Amendment, respondents still must grapple with another threshold inquiry: whether the Due Process Clause imposes any limits on the legislative power. “The four words—due process of law—have been the center of substantial legal debate over the years.” In re Winship, 397 U. S. 358, 378 (1970) (Black, J., dissenting). As I have previously explained, the Due Process Clause may have originally been understood to require only that our Government “ `proceed according to the “law of the land”— that is, according to written constitutional and statutory provisions,' ” before depriving someone of life, liberty, or property. Johnson v. United States, 576 U. S. 591, 623 (2015) (opinion concurring in judgment). Numerous scholars have supported this view, “conclud[ing] that `considerable historical evidence supports the position that “due process of law” was a separation-of-powers concept designed as a safeguard against unlicensed executive action, forbidding only deprivations not authorized by legislation or common law.' ” Ibid. (quoting D. Currie, The Constitution in the Supreme Court: The First Hundred Years 1789–1888, p. 272 (1985)); see also, e. g., E. Corwin, The Doctrine of Due Process of Law Before the Civil War, 24 Harv. L. Rev. 366, 370–373 (1911) (listing reasons to conclude that “the phrase `law of the land' ” did not “import any limitation upon legislative power”); 4 Papers of Alexander Hamilton 35 (H. Syrett & J. Cooke eds. 1962) (“The words `due process' . . . can never be referred to an act of legislature”).
Others have disagreed. For example, some scholars have argued that “as originally understood, `the principle of due process' required, among other things, that `statutes that purported to empower the other branches to deprive persons of rights without adequate procedural guarantees [be] subject to judicial review.' ” Johnson, 576 U. S., at 623 (opinion Page Proof Pending Publication of Thomas, J.) (quoting N. Chapman & M. McConnell, Due Process as Separation of Powers, 121 Yale L. J. 1672, 1679 (2012)).
And, in Murray's Lessee v. Hoboken Land & Improvement Co., 18 How. 272 (1856), the Court itself concluded that the mere existence of a legislative enactment was insuffcient on its own to satisfy due process under the Fifth Amendment. Despite acknowledging that “[t]he words, `due process of law,' were undoubtedly intended to convey the same meaning as the words, `by the law of the land,' in Magna Charta,” the Court concluded that the Due Process Clause “is a restraint on the legislative as well as on the executive and judicial powers of the government.” Id., at 276. The Court famously declared that due process must comport with “those settled usages and modes of proceeding existing in the common and statute law of England, before the emigration of our ancestors, and which are shown not to have been unsuited to their civil and political condition by having been acted on by them after the settlement of this country.” Id., at 277.
These requirements generally include an independent judge, “regular allegations, opportunity to answer, and a trial according to some settled course of judicial proceedings.” Id., at 280. The Court's decision in Murray's Lessee “opened the door to a dramatic reinvention of the Due Process of Law Clause as a check on the statutory enactment of novel methods of procedure.” M. Crema & L. Solum, The Original Meaning of “Due Process of Law” in the Fifth Amendment, 108 Va. L. Rev. 447, 519 (2022).
In these cases, “I need not choose between these two understandings of `due process of law.' ” Johnson, 576 U. S., at 623 (opinion of Thomas, J.). If the “law of the land” view of due process is correct and requires only that Congress have authorized the deprivation of life, liberty, or property that the Federal Government effects, see Sessions v. Di maya, 584 U. S. 148, 207 (2018) (Thomas, J., dissenting), then the PSJVTA's proper enactment resolves the question prePage Proof Pending Publication sented. But, as explained next, even assuming that “settled usages and modes of proceeding” govern the due process inquiry, Murray's Lessee, 18 How., at 277, respondents' due process argument still fails.
II
The Fifth Amendment was never understood to constrain Congress's ability to extend federal jurisdiction. The Federal Government has always possessed the power to extend its jurisdiction beyond the Nation's borders, and, as understood in 1791, the Fifth Amendment did not limit this sovereign prerogative. Rather, insofar as any limits on extraterritorial jurisdiction existed, they stemmed from general principles of international law. But, those principles were defeasible, subconstitutional rules that the sovereign could override through clear command. This understanding respects the Constitution's design by reserving matters of foreign affairs to the political branches.
A
Congress's and the Judiciary's extraterritorial powers are evident in the Constitution. The text is explicit: Congress may “defne and punish Piracies and Felonies committed on the high Seas, and Offences against the Law of Nations,” and it may “make Rules concerning Captures on Land and Water.” Art. I, § 8, cls. 10, 11.
By design, the authority of “the Judicial” branch was to be “commensurate to the legislative and executive Authority.” 1 Records of the Federal Convention 237, n. 18 (M.
Farrand ed. 1911) (statement of James Wilson). “The judicial Power” accordingly “extend[s] to all Cases, in Law and Equity, arising under this Constitution, [and] the Laws of the United States”; “to all Cases of admiralty and maritime Jurisdiction; and to “all Crimes,” including those “not committed within any State.” Art. III, § 2, cls. 1, 3.
Page Proof Pending Publication Page Proof Pending Publication The First Congress, “many of whose members had taken part in framing” the Constitution, Wisconsin v. Pelican Ins. Co., 127 U. S. 265, 297 (1888), exercised its authority to prescribe extraterritorial jurisdiction in the Judiciary Act of 1789. See § 9, 1 Stat. 76–77 (granting federal courts jurisdiction over “civil causes of admiralty and maritime jurisdiction” arising “upon the high seas”); see also, e. g., N. Chapman, Due Process Abroad, 112 Nw. U. L. Rev. 377, 409 (2017) (“[O]ne of the federal government's top priorities” postratifcation was “[t]he prosecution and punishment of extraterritorial crimes, including crimes committed by aliens”). This “actio[n] of the First Congress” is “of course persuasive evidence of what the Constitution means.” Harmelin v. Michi gan, 501 U. S. 957, 980 (1991) (opinion of Scalia, J.); see, e. g., Marsh v. Chambers, 463 U. S. 783, 788–790 (1983). Early treatises further reinforce the conclusion that the Federal Government possessed the power to exercise its jurisdiction beyond its borders, noting for example that “for the purpose of giving jurisdiction,” “on whom or where a piratical offence has been committed” is irrelevant. 1 J. Kent, Commentaries on American Law 174 (1826).
Constitutional text, postratifcation practice, and early commentary thus demonstrate that Congress and the Judiciary can exercise jurisdiction beyond the United States. The question turns to what, if anything, limits this power.
B
Preratifcation and postratifcation courts observed limits on their own and each other's extraterritorial authority. Those limits were originally understood to derive from the international law of nations, not the Constitution. But, Congress always possessed the power to legislate beyond the boundaries that these international-law principles imposed. Early courts routinely applied law-of-nations principles under which personal jurisdiction was “typically a problem in recognition”; that is, “[t]he question for American courts was whether [foreign] judgments would be recognized and enforced.” S. Sachs, Pennoyer Was Right, 95 Texas L. Rev. 1249, 1270 (2017) (Sachs 2017). Because “[e]arly American states stood in much the same position as foreign nations,” they would review each other's jurisdiction and refuse to recognize or enforce foreign judgments that exceeded commonly understood jurisdictional limits. Id., at 1273–1274. In Jenkins v. Putnam,1 S. C. L. 8 (1784)(per curiam), for example, a South Carolina court recognized that whether a North Carolina admiralty court's judgment was due “faith and credit” pursuant to “[t]he act of confederation . . . and the law of nations” turned on whether the foreign court had “competent jurisdiction” to enter the judgment. Id., at 9– 10; see also, e. g., Kibbe v. Kibbe, 1 Kirby 119, 126 (Conn. Super. Ct. 1786) (concluding that a Massachusetts court lacked “legal jurisdiction of the cause” and thus rejecting creditors' attempt to have the court recognize out-of-state judgment).
Courts “continued to reason this way” after the Fifth Amendment's ratifcation in 1791. Sachs 2017, at 1275.
Riding circuit, Justice Story rejected the application of a Massachusetts personal-jurisdiction statute to an absent Louisiana citizen based on the “universal” “principle,” “consonant with the general principles of justice, that the legislature of a state can bind no more than the persons and property within its territorial jurisdiction.” Flower v. Parker, 9 F. Cas. 323, 324–325 (No. 4,891) (CC Mass. 1823). This Court reinforced those principles in D'Arcy v. Ketchum, 11 How. 165, 174 (1851), in which it addressed whether a creditor could enforce a New York judgment in a Louisiana federal court against a “citizen of Louisiana not served with process.” Observing that neither an act of Congress nor a provision of the Constitution had displaced the “wellestablished rules of international law,” the Court concluded that following such a procedure to enforce the New York Page Proof Pending Publication judgment would be “deemed an illegitimate assumption of power.” Id., at 174–176. At bottom, this international-law approach to personal jurisdiction meant that when one government attempted to exercise “jurisdiction which, according to the law of nations, its sovereign could not confer,” that government's “sentences [were] not regarded by foreign courts” irrespective of whether they were valid “within the dominions of the prince from whom the authority is derived.” Rose v. Himely, 4 Cranch 241, 276–277 (1808) (Marshall, C. J., for the Court).
Absent from this approach to personal jurisdiction was any consideration of due process. The Court's omission of such analysis in D'Arcy is illustrative: The Court could have analyzed the legitimacy of enforcing the New York judgment under the New York Constitution—which “contained an exact replica of the Fifth Amendment's Due Process Clause”—but it conspicuously declined to do so. See Brief for Professor Stephen E. Sachs as Amicus Curiae 10 (citing N. Y. Const. of 1846, Art. I, § 6). Due process was not the issue; the “well-established rules of international law” were. 11 How., at 174.
These rules of international law, however, were always understood to be defeasible. Even if Congress generally respected such rules, it retained the power to override them through clear statutory command.
Founding-era courts may have sought to avoid “constru[ing]” statutes “to violate the law of nations if any other possible construction remain[ed],” but they understood that the legislature could depart from this international baseline “by express words or a very plain and necessary implication.” Murray v. Schooner Charming Betsy, 2 Cranch 64, 118 (1804) (Marshall, C. J., for the Court); see also, e. g., Talbot v. Seeman, 1 Cranch 1, 43 (1801) (“[T]he laws of the United States ought not, if it be avoidable, so to be construed as to infract the common principles and usages of nations” (emphaPage Proof Pending Publication Page Proof Pending Publication sis added)). A nation “might always `exercise its territorial powers in a manner not consonant to the usages and received obligations of the civilized world' ”; even if it were “ `considered as violating its faith,' ” the rules still would be “valid within that nation's courts.” S. Sachs, The Unlimited Jurisdiction of the Federal Courts, 106 Va. L. Rev. 1703, 1722 (2020) (Sachs 2020) (quoting Schooner Exchange v. McFad don, 7 Cranch 116, 137 (1812)); accord, e. g., United States v. Yousef, 327 F. 3d 56, 108 (CA2 2003) (the “claim that principles of customary international law constrain Congress's power to enact laws that proscribe extraterritorial conduct is simply wrong”).
This approach reflects the “longstanding principle of American law” that congressional statutes are “meant to apply only within the territorial jurisdiction of the United States”—“unless a contrary intent appears.” EEOC v. Arabian American Oil Co., 499 U. S. 244, 248 (1991) (emphasis added; internal quotation marks omitted); cf. Blackmer v. United States, 284 U. S. 421, 437 (1932) (whether “the legislation of the Congress” applies extraterritorially to “citizens of the United States in foreign countries” is a “question of . . . construction, not of legislative power”). Given that principles of international law formed the basis for early understandings of personal jurisdiction, Congress's general ability to override those principles strongly implies its power to effect extraterritorial jurisdiction beyond what the law of nations might permit.
This conclusion becomes nearly inescapable when taking into account the views of early jurists who considered the question. For example, Justice Johnson, while dissenting on a separate point, acknowledged as an “eternal principl[e] of justice” the precept “that jurisdiction cannot be justly exercised by a state over property not within the reach of its process, or over persons not owing them allegiance or . . . found within their limits.” Mills v. Duryee, 7 Cranch 481, 486 (1813). Nevertheless, he had no trouble concluding that courts could “dispense with” that principle “when compelled by positive statute.” Ibid.; see Sachs 2020, at 1722.
Justice Story shared this view. In Picquet v. Swan, 19 F. Cas. 609, 613 (No. 11,134) (CC Mass. 1828), the plaintiff sued a defendant residing abroad through jurisdictionally dubious means, the implications of which might suggest that “a subject of England, or France, or Russia . . . may be summoned from the other end of the globe to obey our process, and submit to the judgment of our courts.” Justice Story concluded that Congress had not authorized the plaintiff 's expansive theory of federal jurisdiction, which would interfere with “principles of . . . immutable justice.” Id., at 614. But, he made clear that this absence of congressional action was due to a lack of will, not power: “If congress had prescribed such a rule, the court would certainly be bound to follow it, and proceed upon the law.” Id., at 615. In other words, “foreign-based defendants were owed no more than service authorized by Congress before being haled into our federal courts.” Antrix Corp., 91 F. 4th, at 1352 (opinion of Bumatay, J.) (citing Picquet, 19 F. Cas., at 613, 615–616). This Court eventually endorsed Justice Story's analysis.
In Toland v. Sprague, 12 Pet. 300, 302 (1838), as in Picquet, the Court addressed whether a federal statute authorized a plaintiff 's attempt to have the federal court exercise personal jurisdiction over a defendant residing abroad. Assigning “great force” to the reasoning of Picquet, the Toland Court held that Congress had not contemplated federal jurisdiction over those “who were in a foreign jurisdiction,” and thus had not extended “the reach of the process of the courts” over those individuals. 12 Pet., at 328–330. Nevertheless, the Court followed Justice Story's analysis and concluded that federal courts would be bound to exercise such jurisdiction if Congress required it through “positive legislation,” no matter how “unjust.” Id., at 329–330; see also 101 F. 4th 190, 218–219 (CA2 2024) (Menashi, J., dissenting from denial Page Proof Pending Publication of rehearing en banc) (detailing the Toland Court's “embrac[e]” of Justice Story's reasoning).
Subsequent historical and legal developments, including the ratifcation of the Fourteenth Amendment, have not changed the fundamental point that the Fifth Amendment's Due Process Clause does not territorially confne the Federal Government's jurisdiction.3 During the Lochner era, for example, this Court began to determine that the Fourteenth Amendment restricts States' ability to adjudicate cases involving conduct beyond their borders. See, e. g., Baker v. Baker, Eccles & Co., 242 U. S. 394, 403 (1917). But, the Court during that period continued to recognize that the Fifth Amendment provides “no ground for constructing an imaginary constitutional barrier around the exterior confnes of the United States for the purpose of shutting [the federal] government off from the exertion of powers which inherently belong to it by virtue of its sovereignty.” United States v. Bennett, 232 U. S. 299, 306 (1914); see also Brief for Petitioners in No. 24–20, pp. 27–28.
Cases from the founding era onward have continually reaffrmed that the Fifth Amendment was never understood to impose limits on the exercise of personal jurisdiction. Any 3Until today, this Court had continually left open the question whether the Fifth Amendment's Due Process Clause constrains the Federal Government to the same extent that the Fourteenth Amendment's Due Process Clause limits the States. See, e. g., Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. v. Supe rior Court of Cal., San Francisco Cty., 582 U. S. 255, 268–269 (2017); Omni Capital Int'l, Ltd. v. Rudolf Wolff & Co., 484 U. S. 97, 102–103, n. 5 (1987). That reservation was appropriate. Because it makes little sense to interpret the Fifth Amendment's Due Process Clause according to this Court's interpretation of the later ratifed, identical language in the Fourteenth Amendment, I agree with the majority that the Fourteenth Amendment's “minimum contacts” due process inquiry is inapposite here. Ante, at 16. But, it may well be that the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment should inform our understanding of parallel language in the Fourteenth Amendment.
Page Proof Pending Publication such limits derived from international law, which Congress could override.
C
That Congress may override general principles of international law does not imply that it should, but instead that the relevant considerations are not constitutional ones. Serious nonconstitutional considerations include implications for foreign policy. But, concerns over foreign affairs are no reason to impose constitutional limits on federal courts' extraterritorial jurisdiction. Just the opposite—the implications of such limitations on the political branches' power to conduct foreign policy reinforce the conclusion that the Constitution does not inhibit the Federal Government's ability to extend its jurisdiction extraterritorially.
As the foregoing demonstrates, Congress has the power to subject foreign nationals to what they might view as overly broad jurisdiction. In response, countries may decide to enact “ `retaliatory' jurisdictional provisions” that “empower [their] national courts to exercise jurisdiction over [American citizens] in circumstances where [American] courts . . . would have asserted jurisdiction.” G. Born, Refections on Judicial Jurisdiction in International Cases, 17 Ga. J. Int'l & Comp. L. 1, 15 (1987) (Born); see also ante, at 18. Constitutionally unchecked authority to extend federal jurisdiction thus undeniably has the potential to generate repercussions in foreign affairs. See Tr. of Oral Arg. 55–56 (counsel for the Federal Government acknowledging that the Government could face “problems” with “retaliation” were Congress to exercise jurisdiction “very far and wide”); Brief for United States 47–48.
But, that possibility is no basis for erecting constitutional barriers here. The “feld of foreign affairs” requires “delicate judgments, involving a balance that is the prerogative of the political branches to make,” and these judgments are “entitled to special respect.” Jesner v. Arab Bank, PLC, 584 U. S. 241, 273 (2018) (plurality opinion). “Congress has Page Proof Pending Publication the undisputed power to decide . . . whether and under what circumstances foreign nations should be amenable to suit in the United States.” Verlinden B. V. v. Central Bank of Nigeria, 461 U. S. 480, 493 (1983) (emphasis added). That power is not diminished simply because the United States does not recognize the sovereignty of the foreign governmental entity at issue.
Although it is possible that Congress might extend federal jurisdiction to such a degree that foreign actors retaliate, “the controlling role of the political branches” remains “both necessary and proper.” Bank Markazi v. Peterson, 578 U. S. 212, 234 (2016). After all, other countries can exercise their jurisdiction in offensive ways, too. And, if they do, our political branches may decide to enact “ `retaliatory' jurisdictional provisions” of their own. Born 15; accord, e. g., The Nereide, 9 Cranch 388, 423 (1815) (“If it be the will of the government to apply to Spain any rule respecting captures which Spain is supposed to apply to us, the government will manifest that will by passing an act for the purpose”).
Applying constitutional limits to Congress's authority to enact such provisions would risk impeding the political branches' efforts to conduct foreign affairs in federal litigation. That is no small matter. Civil litigation can be a bargaining chip in foreign policy. As this Court has explained, “[n]ot infrequently in affairs between nations, outstanding claims by nationals of one country against the government of another country are `sources of friction' between the two sovereigns.” Dames & Moore v. Regan, 453 U. S. 654, 679 (1981) (quoting United States v. Pink, 315 U. S. 203, 225 (1942)). Following “ `established international practice refecting traditional international theory,' ” nations frequently enter into agreements to settle the claims of their respective nationals. Dames & Moore, 453 U. S., at 679; see also, e. g., Chas. T. Main Int'l, Inc. v. Khuzestan Water and Power Auth., 651 F. 2d 800, 811 (CA1 1981) (collecting examples of the Federal Government “extinguish[ing] claims of United Page Proof Pending Publication States nationals against foreign governments” in exchange for various concessions). Limiting the political branches' ability to extend extraterritorial jurisdiction could stymie its use of this tool for international negotiation, in turn sowing tension with the fundamental premise that foreign policy is the domain of the political branches, not the federal courts. See Bank Markazi, 578 U. S., at 234; cf. Ex parte Peru, 318 U. S. 578, 589 (1943) (“[O]ur national interest will be better served [if] cases . . . involving our relations with a friendly foreign power, are righted through diplomatic negotiations rather than by the compulsions of judicial proceedings”). This potential intrusion on the political branches' authority supports what the historical evidence makes clear: The Fifth Amendment's Due Process Clause imposes no limits on the Federal Government's power to extend federal jurisdiction beyond the Nation's borders. See supra, at 35–41.
* * * The Court's opinion does not foreclose the “maximalist theory of federal jurisdiction” compelled by the original understanding of the Fifth Amendment, but resolves the cases without deciding whether that understanding is correct.
Ante, at 18. In my view, “historical evidence from the framing” provides the proper framework for deciding these cases, McIntyre, 514 U. S., at 370 (opinion of Thomas, J.), and that evidence demonstrates that the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment places no territorial limitation on Congress's ability to call parties to answer.4 And, for the rea4The concepts of notice and an opportunity to be heard are distinct from the Federal Government's authority to extend personal jurisdiction. Although the Fifth Amendment places no limit on the latter, it may still require that defendants be given notice and an opportunity to be heard. I do not decide that question today. Even assuming the Fifth Amendment does impose such requirements, the PLO and the PA have received due process. Both entities received notice of this suit through service of process on a representative, and the entities have not claimed that it is infeasible to defend themselves in American courts.
Page Proof Pending Publication sons explained, this conclusion respects our deferential approach to the political branches' “delicate judgments” in foreign affairs. Jesner, 584 U. S., at 273 (plurality opinion). Insofar as the Fifth Amendment's Due Process Clause requires deprivations of life, liberty, or property to accord with “those settled usages and modes of proceeding existing” at common law, Murray's Lessee, 18 How., at 277, the PSJVTA plainly meets that standard. Nothing on the statute's face or in its application here deprives respondents of an independent judge, “regular allegations, opportunity to answer, [or] a trial according to some settled course of judicial proceedings.” Id., at 280. And, even assuming that the law of nations might otherwise supply a rule of decision and that the PSJVTA's jurisdictional provisions are in tension with such a rule—questions on which I take no position here— those principles of international law are defeasible presumptions that Congress unmistakably overrode when it enacted the PSJVTA. In my view, the Fifth Amendment due process inquiry ends there.
Page Proof Pending Publication Page Proof Pending Publication Reporter’s Note The attached opinion has been revised to refect the usual publication and citation style of the United States Reports. The revised pagination makes available the offcial United States Reports citation in advance of publication. The syllabus has been prepared by the Reporter of Decisions for the convenience of the reader and constitutes no part of the opinion of the Court. A list of counsel who argued or fled briefs in this case, and who were members of the bar of this Court at the time this case was argued, has been inserted following the syllabus. Other revisions may include adjustments to formatting, captions, citation form, and any errant punctuation. The following additional edits were made: p. 39, line 20: “the” is inserted before “Congress”