Cite as: 513 U. S. 527 (1995)
Thomas, J., concurring in judgment
functions and roles of the parties" and the "traditional concepts of the role of admiralty law." App. to Pet. for Cert. in No. 93-1094, p. 32a. Such considerations have no place in the Sisson test and should have no role in any jurisdictional inquiry. The dangers of a totality-of-the-circumstances approach to jurisdiction should be obvious. An undefined test requires courts and litigants to devote substantial resources to determine whether a federal court may hear a specific case. Such a test also introduces undesirable uncertainty into the affairs of private actors—even those involved in common maritime activities—who cannot predict whether or not their conduct may justify the exercise of admiralty jurisdiction.
Although the majority makes an admirable attempt to clarify what Sisson obscures, I am afraid that its analysis cannot mitigate the confusion of the Sisson test. Thus, faced with the "potential to disrupt maritime commerce" prong, ante, at 538, the majority must resort to "an intermediate level of possible generality" to determine the " 'general features' " of the incident here, ibid. The majority does not explain the origins of "levels of generality," nor, to my knowledge, do we employ such a concept in other areas of jurisdiction. We do not use "levels of generality" to characterize residency or amount in controversy for diversity purposes, or to determine the presence of a federal question. Nor does the majority explain why an "intermediate" level of generality is appropriate. It is even unclear what an intermediate level of generality is, and we cannot expect that district courts will apply such a concept uniformly in similar cases. It is far from obvious how the undefined intermediate level of generality indicates that the "incident" for Sisson purposes is that of a vessel damaging an underwater structure.
The majority also applies levels of generality to the next prong of Sisson—whether the tortfeasor is engaged in "activity" that shows a "substantial relationship to traditional
553
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