corporate-law
Are most major lawsuits against corporations filed in federal courts in the U.S.?
<p>My impression is that this is true, but I am not sure. By &quot;major&quot;, I meant lawsuits that potentially lead to large sums in damages.</p>
<p>If you have any hard statistics to share, please do!</p>

<p>No...  in fact the vast majority of major corporations are filed in Delaware of all places.  This is due to friendly Usury Laws as well as favorable buisness laws.  Half of the S&amp;P500 buisnesses are incorporated in Deleware even if they do no buisness there.</p>
<p>Additionally, suits may filed in state courts against a corporation that does buisness in the state reguardless as to where it's corprate headquarters is.  In some cases, such as media entities in defamation cases, the suit may be in the jurisidiction of the plaintif rather than the state of headquarters of the company.</p>
<p>Typcially, Corporations that are sued in federal court will move to hear the case in a favorable state (either one where they are in the jurisdiction of the incident OR Delaware OR Home State) and often terms of service and liscense agreements will list the court of jurisdiction as part of the terms, meaning a user contracts away their right to fight over jurisdiction.   Federal courts rarely hear cases, and most originate where the Federal Government is the plaintif of the suit.</p>

<p><strong>Yes</strong>, with the notable exceptions of the top two tobacco settlements, by far the very big ones are federal. Securities cases, FDA cases, Clean Air and Water cases, etc.</p>
<p>The top of the biggest corporate settlements include these federal cases - BP: $20 billion + some states, Bank of America: $16 billion, Volkswagen: $14.7 billion, Bayer/Monsanto: $10.9 billion, Enron: $7.2 billion, WorldCom: $6.1 billion, Galaxo SmithKline: $3 billion, Tyco  $2.9 billion, AOL-Time Warner: $2.8 Billion.</p>
<p>Plus some I found at <a href="https://www.gjel.com/blog/largest-class-action-settlements.html" rel="nofollow noreferrer">another source</a>, all federal.</p>
<ul>
<li>Fen-Phen diet drugs $3.8 billion</li>
<li>American Indian Trust $3.4 billion</li>
<li>Silicone breast implants $3.4 billion</li>
<li>Cendant accounting fraud $3.2
billion</li>
</ul>
<p>Yet another source has Anadarko/Kerr McGee $5.15 billion federal for environmental clean up.</p>
<p>However the top two are the big Master Tobacco settlement which was 46 states at $206 billion and the separate R.J Reynolds settlement at $23 billion with Florida.</p>
<p>And the favorite place for big patent suits is the Eastern District of Texas were judges and juries seem to lean towards infringement plaintiffs.</p>
