ABSTRACT
Choice of law problems, it is often said, arise because legislatures do not specify the scope of their laws: they do not state explicitly to whom a law grants rights, or where. But what if they do? One view, adopted in the draft Third Restatement of Conflict of Laws, is that choice-of-law analysts should accept the help and follow legislative instruction about the scope of state laws. Another view, put forward during debates over the draft Third Restatement and more recently in law review articles, is that courts should ignore what legislatures say about the laws they are writing. This essay attempts to explain why the Third Restatement takes the position it does and to give readers greater insight into the difficulties of the contrary perspective.
Roosevelt, Kermit, Choice of Law and Statutory Specifications of Scope (July 3, 2025), University of Pennsylvnia Law School, Public Law Research Paper No 25-30; Journal of Transnational Law & Policy, volume 34, p 49, 2025.
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