446
Opinion of the Court
ana Code of Civil Procedure, which renders the doctrine of forum non conveniens unavailable in Jones Act and maritime law cases brought in Louisiana state courts, is not preempted by federal maritime law. 595 So. 2d 615 (1992). American Dredging Company filed a petition for a writ of certiorari, which we granted. 507 U. S. 1028 (1993).
II
The Constitution provides that the federal judicial power "shall extend . . . to all Cases of admiralty and maritime Jurisdiction." U. S. Const., Art. III, § 2, cl. 1. Federal-court jurisdiction over such cases, however, has never been entirely exclusive. The Judiciary Act of 1789 provided:
"That the district courts shall have, exclusively of the courts of the several States . . . exclusive original cognizance of all civil causes of admiralty and maritime jurisdiction . . . within their respective districts as well as upon the high seas; saving to suitors, in all cases, the right of a common law remedy, where the common law is competent to give it." § 9, 1 Stat. 76-77 (emphasis added).
The emphasized language is known as the "saving to suitors clause." This provision has its modern expression at 28 U. S. C. § 1333(1), which reads (with emphasis added):
"The district courts shall have original jurisdiction, exclusive of the courts of the States, of:
"(1) Any civil case of admiralty or maritime jurisdiction, saving to suitors in all cases all other remedies to which they are otherwise entitled."
We have held it to be the consequence of exclusive federal jurisdiction that state courts "may not provide a remedy in rem for any cause of action within the admiralty jurisdiction." Red Cross Line v. Atlantic Fruit Co., 264 U. S. 109, 124 (1924). An in rem suit against a vessel is, we have said,
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