Jesner v. Arab Bank, 2018 U.S. LEXIS 2631 (U.S. Apr. 24, 2018)  (Kennedy, J., announced the judgment of the Court and delivered the opinion of the Court with respect to Parts I, II-B-1, and II-C, in which Roberts, C. J., and Thomas, Alito, and Gorsuch, JJ., joined, and an opinion with respect to Parts II-A, II-B-2, II-B-3, and III, in which Roberts, C. J., and Thomas, J., joined. Thomas, J., filed a concurring opinion. Alito, J., and Gorsuch, J., filed opinions concurring in part and concurring in the judgment. Sotomayor, J., filed a dissenting opinion, in which Ginsburg, Breyer, and Kagan, [*14]  JJ., joined) :

 Petitioners in this case, or the persons on whose behalf petitioners now assert claims, allegedly were injured or killed by terrorist acts committed abroad. Those terrorist acts, it is contended, were in part caused or facilitated by a foreign corporation. Petitioners now seek to impose liability on the foreign corporation for the conduct of its human agents, including its then-chairman and other high-ranking management officials. The suits were filed in a United States District Court under the Alien Tort Statute, commonly referred to as the ATS. See 28 U. S. C. §1350.

 The foreign corporation charged with liability in these ATS suits is Arab Bank, PLC; and it is respondent here. Some of Arab Bank’s officials, it is alleged, allowed the Bank to be used to transfer funds to terrorist groups in the Middle East, which in turn enabled or facilitated criminal acts of terrorism, causing the deaths or injuries for which petitioners now seek compensation. [*15]  Petitioners seek to prove Arab Bank helped the terrorists receive the moneys in part by means of currency clearances and bank transactions passing through its New York City offices, all by means of electronic transfers.

 It is assumed here that those individuals who inflicted death or injury by terrorism committed crimes in violation of well-settled, fundamental precepts of international law, precepts essential for basic human-rights protections. It is assumed as well that individuals who knowingly and purposefully facilitated banking transactions to aid, enable, or facilitate the terrorist acts would themselves be committing crimes under the same international-law prohibitions.

 Petitioners contend that international and domestic laws impose responsibility and liability on a corporation if its human agents use the corporation to commit crimes in violation of international laws that protect human rights. The question here is whether the Judiciary has the authority, in an ATS action, to make that determination and then to enforce that liability in ATS suits, all without any explicit authorization from Congress to do so.

 The answer turns upon the proper interpretation and implementation [*16]  of the ATS. The statute provides: “The district courts shall have original jurisdiction of any civil action by an alien for a tort only, committed in violation of the law of nations or a treaty of the United States.” §1350. The Court must first ask whether the law of nations imposes liability on corporations for human-rights violations committed by its employees. The Court must also ask whether it has authority and discretion in an ATS suit to impose liability on a corporation without a specific direction from Congress to do so.

 I

A

 Petitioners are plaintiffs in five ATS lawsuits filed against Arab Bank in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York. The suits were filed between 2004 and 2010.

 A significant majority of the plaintiffs in these lawsuits—about 6,000 of them—are foreign nationals whose claims arise under the ATS. These foreign nationals are petitioners here. They allege that they or their family members were injured by terrorist attacks in the Middle East over a 10-year period. Two of the five lawsuits also included claims brought by American nationals under the Anti-Terrorism Act, 18 U. S. C. §2333(a), but those claims are not at issue.

 Arab Bank is a major Jordanian [*17]  financial institution with branches throughout the world, including in New York. According to the Kingdom of Jordan, Arab Bank “accounts for between one-fifth and one-third of the total market capitalization of the Amman Stock Exchange.” Brief for Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan as Amicus Curiae 2. Petitioners allege that Arab Bank helped finance attacks by Hamas and other terrorist groups. Among other claims, petitioners allege that Arab Bank maintained bank accounts for terrorists and their front groups and allowed the accounts to be used to pay the families of suicide bombers.

 Most of petitioners’ allegations involve conduct that occurred in the Middle East. Yet petitioners allege as well that Arab Bank used its New York branch to clear dollar-denominated transactions through the Clearing House Interbank Payments System. That elaborate system is commonly referred to as CHIPS. It is alleged that some of these CHIPS transactions benefited terrorists.

 Foreign banks often use dollar-clearing transactions to facilitate currency exchanges or to make payments in dollars from one foreign bank account to another. Arab Bank and certain amici point out that CHIPS transactions are enormous both [*18]  in volume and in dollar amounts. The transactions occur predominantly in the United States but are used by major banks both in the United States and abroad. The CHIPS system is used for dollar-denominated transactions and for transactions where the dollar is used as an intermediate currency to facilitate a currency exchange. Brief for Institute of International Bankers as Amicus Curiae 12-13, and n. 8. In New York each day, on average, about 440,000 of these transfers occur, in dollar amounts totaling about $1.5 trillion. Id., at 14. The “clearance activity is an entirely mechanical function; it occurs without human intervention in the proverbial ‘blink of an eye.’” Ibid. There seems to be no dispute that the speed and volume of these transactions are such that individual supervision is simply not a systemic reality. As noted below, substantial regulations govern these transactions, both in the United States and in Jordan.

 In addition to the dollar-clearing transactions, petitioners allege that Arab Bank’s New York branch was used to launder money for the Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development (HLF), a Texas-based charity that petitioners say is affiliated with Hamas. According to petitioners, [*19]  Arab Bank used its New York branch to facilitate the transfer of funds from HLF to the bank accounts of terrorist-affiliated charities in the Middle East.

 During the pendency of this litigation, there was an unrelated case that also implicated the issue whether the ATS is applicable to suits in this country against foreign corporations. See Kiobel v. Royal Dutch Petroleum Co., 621 F. 3d 111 (CA2 2010). That suit worked its way through the trial court and the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. The Kiobel litigation did not involve banking transactions. Its allegations were that holding companies incorporated in the Netherlands and the United Kingdom had, through a Nigerian subsidiary, aided and abetted the Nigerian Government in human-rights abuses. Id., at 123. In Kiobel, the Court of Appeals held that the ATS does not extend to suits against corporations. Id., at 120. This Court granted certiorari in Kiobel. 565 U. S. 961 (2011).

 After additional briefing and reargument in Kiobel, this Court held that, given all the circumstances, the suit could not be maintained under the ATS. Kiobel v. Royal Dutch Petroleum Co., 569 U. S. 108, 114, 124-125 (2013). The rationale of the holding, however, was not that the ATS does not extend to suits against foreign corporations. That question was left unresolved. The Court ruled, instead, that “all the relevant conduct [*20]  took place outside the United States.” Id., at 124. Dismissal of the action was required based on the presumption against extraterritorial application of statutes.

 So while this Court in Kiobel affirmed the ruling that the action there could not be maintained, it did not address the broader holding of the Court of Appeals that dismissal was required because corporations may not be sued under the ATS. Still, the courts of the Second Circuit deemed that broader holding to be binding precedent. As a consequence, in the instant case the District Court dismissed petitioners’ ATS claims based on the earlier Kiobel holding in the Court of Appeals; and on review of the dismissal order the Court of Appeals, also adhering to its earlier holding, affirmed. In re Arab Bank, PLC Alien Tort Statute Litigation, 808 F. 3d 144 (2015). This Court granted certiorari in the instant case. 581 U. S. ___ (2017).

 Since the Court of Appeals relied on its Kiobel holding in the instant case, it is instructive to begin with an analysis of that decision. The majority opinion in Kiobel, written by Judge Cabranes, held that the ATS does not apply to alleged international-law violations by a corporation. 621 F. 3d, at 120. Judge Cabranes relied in large part on the fact that international criminal tribunals have consistently limited [*21]  their jurisdiction to natural persons. Id., at 132-137.

 Judge Leval filed a separate opinion. He concurred in the judgment on other grounds but disagreed with the proposition that the foreign corporation was not subject to suit under the ATS. Id., at 196. Judge Leval conceded that “international law, of its own force, imposes no liabilities on corporations or other private juridical entities.” Id., at 186. But he reasoned that corporate liability for violations of international law is an issue of “civil compensatory liability” that international law leaves to individual nations. Ibid. Later decisions in the Courts of Appeals for the Seventh, Ninth, and District of Columbia Circuits agreed with Judge Leval and held that corporations can be subject to suit under the ATS. See Flomo v. Firestone Nat. Rubber Co., 643 F. 3d 1013, 1017-1021 (CA7 2011); Doe I v. Nestle USA, Inc., 766 F. 3d 1013, 1020-1022 (CA9 2014); Doe VIII v. Exxon Mobil Corp., 654 F. 3d 11, 40-55 (CADC 2011), vacated on other grounds, 527 Fed. Appx. 7 (CADC 2013). The respective opinions by Judges Cabranes and Leval are scholarly and extensive, providing significant guidance for this Court in the case now before it.

 With this background, it is now proper to turn to the history of the ATS and the decisions interpreting it.

B

 Under the Articles of Confederation, the Continental Congress lacked authority to “‘cause infractions of treaties, or of the law of nations to be punished.’” [*22]  Sosa v. Alvarez-Machain, 542 U. S. 692, 716 (2004) (quoting J. Madison, Journal of the Constitutional Convention 60 (E. Scott ed. 1893)). The Continental Congress urged the States to authorize suits for damages sustained by foreign citizens as a result of violations of international law; but the state courts’ vindication of the law of nations remained unsatisfactory. Concerns with the consequent international-relations tensions “persisted through the time of the Constitutional Convention.” 542 U. S., at 717.

 Under the Articles of Confederation, the inability of the central government to ensure adequate remedies for foreign citizens caused substantial foreign-relations problems. In 1784, the French Minister lodged a protest with the Continental Congress after a French adventurer, the Chevalier de Longchamps, assaulted the Secretary of the French Legation in Philadelphia. See Kiobel, 569 U. S., at 120. A few years later, a New York constable caused an international incident when he entered the house of the Dutch Ambassador and arrested one of his servants. Ibid. Under the Articles of Confederation, there was no national forum available to resolve disputes like these under any binding laws that were or could be enacted or enforced by a central government.

 The Framers addressed [*23]  these matters at the 1787 Philadelphia Convention; and, as a result, Article III of the Constitution extends the federal judicial power to “all cases affecting ambassadors, other public ministers and consuls,” and “to controversies . . . between a state, or the citizens thereof, and foreign states, citizens, or subjects.” §2. The First Congress passed a statute to implement these provisions: The Judiciary Act of 1789 authorized federal jurisdiction over suits involving disputes between aliens and United States citizens and suits involving diplomats. §§9, 11, 1 Stat. 76-79.

 The Judiciary Act also included what is now the statute known as the ATS. §9, id., at 76. As noted, the ATS is central to this case and its brief text bears repeating. Its full text is: “The district courts shall have original jurisdiction of any civil action by an alien for a tort only, committed in violation of the law of nations or a treaty of the United States.” 28 U. S. C. §1350.

 The ATS is “strictly jurisdictional” and does not by its own terms provide or delineate the definition of a cause of action for violations of international law. Sosa, 542 U. S., at 713-714. But the statute was not enacted to sit on a shelf awaiting further legislation. Id., at 714. Rather, Congress enacted it against the backdrop of the general common [*24]  law, which in 1789 recognized a limited category of “torts in violation of the law of nations.” Ibid.

 In the 18th century, international law primarily governed relationships between and among nation-states, but in a few instances it governed individual conduct occurring outside national borders (for example, “disputes relating to prizes, to shipwrecks, to hostages, and ransom bills”). Id., at 714-715 (internal quotation marks omitted). There was, furthermore, a narrow domain in which “rules binding individuals for the benefit of other individuals overlapped with” the rules governing the relationships between nation-states. Id., at 715. As understood by Blackstone, this domain included “three specific offenses against the law of nations addressed by the criminal law of England: violation of safe conducts, infringement of the rights of ambassadors, and piracy.” Ibid. (citing 4 W. Blackstone, Commentaries on the Laws of England 68 (1769)). “It was this narrow set of violations of the law of nations, admitting of a judicial remedy and at the same time threatening serious consequences in international affairs, that was probably on the minds of the men who drafted the ATS.” 542 U. S., at 715.

 This history teaches that Congress [*25]  drafted the ATS “to furnish jurisdiction for a relatively modest set of actions alleging violations of the law of nations.” Id., at 720. The principal objective of the statute, when first enacted, was to avoid foreign entanglements by ensuring the availability of a federal forum where the failure to provide one might cause another nation to hold the United States responsible for an injury to a foreign citizen. See id., at 715-719; Kiobel, 569 U. S., at 123-124.

 Over the first 190 years or so after its enactment, the ATS was invoked but a few times. Yet with the evolving recognition—for instance, in the Nuremberg trials after World War II—that certain acts constituting crimes against humanity are in violation of basic precepts of international law, courts began to give some redress for violations of international human-rights protections that are clear and unambiguous. In the modern era this began with the decision of the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit in Filartiga v. Pena-Irala, 630 F. 2d 876 (1980).

 In Filartiga, it was alleged that a young man had been tortured and murdered by Peruvian police officers, and that an officer named Pena-Irala was one of the supervisors and perpetrators. Some members of the victim’s family were in the United States on visas. When they [*26]  discovered that Pena-Irala himself was living in New York, they filed suit against him. The action, seeking damages for the suffering and death he allegedly had caused, was filed in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York. The Court of Appeals found that there was jurisdiction under the ATS. For this holding it relied upon the universal acknowledgment that acts of official torture are contrary to the law of nations. Id., at 890. This Court did not review that decision.

 In the midst of debates in the courts of appeals over whether the court in Filartiga was correct in holding that plaintiffs could bring ATS actions based on modern human rights laws absent an express cause of action created by an additional statute, Congress enacted the Torture Victim Protection Act of 1991 (TVPA), 106 Stat. 73, note following 28 U. S. C. §1350. H. R. Rep. No. 102-367, pp. 3-4 (1991) (H. R. Rep.) (citing Tel-Oren v. Libyan Arab Republic, 726 F. 2d 774 (CADC 1984)); S. Rep. No. 102-249, pp. 3-5 (1991) (S. Rep.) (same). The TVPA—which is codified as a note following the ATS—creates an express cause of action for victims of torture and extrajudicial killing in violation of international law.

 After Filartiga and the TVPA, ATS lawsuits became more frequent. Modern ATS litigation [*27]  has the potential to involve large groups of foreign plaintiffs suing foreign corporations in the United States for alleged human-rights violations in other nations. For example, in Kiobel the plaintiffs were Nigerian nationals who sued Dutch, British, and Nigerian corporations for alleged crimes in Nigeria. 569 U. S., at 111-112. The extent and scope of this litigation in United States courts have resulted in criticism here and abroad. See id., at 124 (noting objections to ATS litigation by Canada, Germany, Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, South Africa, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom).

 In Sosa, the Court considered the question whether courts may recognize new, enforceable international norms in ATS lawsuits. 542 U. S., at 730-731. The Sosa Court acknowledged the decisions made in Filartiga and similar cases; and it held that in certain narrow circumstances courts may recognize a common-law cause of action for claims based on the present-day law of nations, in addition to the “historical paradigms familiar when §1350 was enacted.” 542 U. S., at 732. The Court was quite explicit, however, in holding that ATS litigation implicates serious separation-of-powers and foreign-relations concerns. Id., at 727-728. Thus, ATS claims must be “subject to vigilant doorkeeping.” Id., at 729.

 This [*28]  Court next addressed the ATS in Kiobel, the case already noted. There, this Court held that “the presumption against extraterritoriality applies to claims under the ATS, and that nothing in the statute rebuts the presumption.” 569 U. S., at 124. The Court added that “even where the claims touch and concern the territory of the United States, they must do so with sufficient force to displace the presumption against extraterritorial application.” Id., at 124-125.

II

 With these principles in mind, this Court now must decide whether common-law liability under the ATS extends to a foreign corporate defendant. It could be argued, under the Court’s holding in Kiobel, that even if, under accepted principles of international law and federal common law, corporations are subject to ATS liability for human-rights crimes committed by their human agents, in this case the activities of the defendant corporation and the alleged actions of its employees have insufficient connections to the United States to subject it to jurisdiction under the ATS. Various amici urge this as a rationale to affirm here, while the Government argues that the Court should remand this case so the Court of Appeals can address the issue in the first instance. [*29]  There are substantial arguments on both sides of that question; but it is not the question on which this Court granted certiorari, nor is it the question that has divided the Courts of Appeals.

 The question whether foreign corporations are subject to liability under the ATS should be addressed; for, if there is no liability for Arab Bank, the lengthy and costly litigation concerning whether corporate contacts like those alleged here suffice to impose liability would be pointless. In addition, a remand to the Court of Appeals would require prolonging litigation that already has caused significant diplomatic tensions with Jordan for more than a decade. So it is proper for this Court to decide whether corporations, or at least foreign corporations, are subject to liability in an ATS suit filed in a United States district court.

 Before recognizing a common-law action under the ATS, federal courts must apply the test announced in Sosa. An initial, threshold question is whether a plaintiff can demonstrate that the alleged violation is “of a norm that is specific, universal, and obligatory.” 542 U. S., at 732 (internal quotation marks omitted). And even assuming that, under international law, there is a specific [*30]  norm that can be controlling, it must be determined further whether allowing this case to proceed under the ATS is a proper exercise of judicial discretion, or instead whether caution requires the political branches to grant specific authority before corporate liability can be imposed. See id., at 732-733, and nn. 20-21. “[T]he potential implications for the foreign relations of the United States of recognizing such causes should make courts particularly wary of impinging on the discretion of the Legislative and Executive Branches in managing foreign affairs.” Id., at 727.

 It must be said that some of the considerations that pertain to determining whether there is a specific, universal, and obligatory norm that is established under international law are applicable as well in determining whether deference must be given to the political branches. For instance, the fact that the charters of some international tribunals and the provisions of some congressional statutes addressing international human-rights violations are specifically limited to individual wrongdoers, and thus foreclose corporate liability, has significant bearing both on the content of the norm being asserted and the question whether courts [*31]  should defer to Congress. The two inquiries inform each other and are, to that extent, not altogether discrete.

 With that introduction, it is proper now to turn first to the question whether there is an international-law norm imposing liability on corporations for acts of their employees that contravene fundamental human rights.

A

 Petitioners and Arab Bank disagree as to whether corporate liability is a question of international law or only a question of judicial authority and discretion under domestic law. The dispute centers on a footnote in Sosa. In the course of holding that international norms must be “sufficiently definite to support a cause of action,” the Court in Sosa noted that a “related consideration is whether international law extends the scope of liability for a violation of a given norm to the perpetrator being sued, if the defendant is a private actor such as a corporation or individual.” Id., at 732, and n. 20.

 In the Court of Appeals’ decision in Kiobel, the majority opinion by Judge Cabranes interpreted footnote 20 to mean that corporate defendants may be held liable under the ATS only if there is a specific, universal, and obligatory norm that corporations are liable for [*32]  violations of international law. 621 F. 3d, at 127. In Judge Cabranes’ view, “[i]nternational law is not silent on the question of the subjects of international law—that is, those that, to varying extents, have legal status, personality, rights, and duties under international law,” “[n]or does international law leave to individual States the responsibility of defining those subjects.” Id., at 126 (internal quotation marks omitted). There is considerable force and weight to the position articulated by Judge Cabranes. And, assuming the Court of Appeals was correct that under Sosa corporate liability is a question of international law, there is an equally strong argument that petitioners cannot satisfy the high bar of demonstrating a specific, universal, and obligatory norm of liability for corporations. Indeed, Judge Leval agreed with the conclusion that international law does “not provide for any form of liability of corporations.” Kiobel, 621 F. 3d, at 186.

1

 In modern times, there is no doubt, of course, that “the international community has come to recognize the common danger posed by the flagrant disregard of basic human rights,” leading “the nations of the world to recognize that respect for fundamental human rights is in their [*33]  individual and collective interest.” Filartiga, 630 F. 2d, at 890. That principle and commitment support the conclusion that human-rights norms must bind the individual men and women responsible for committing humanity’s most terrible crimes, not just nation-states in their interactions with one another. “The singular achievement of international law since the Second World War has come in the area of human rights,” where international law now imposes duties on individuals as well as nation-states. Kiobel, 621 F. 3d, at 118.

 It does not follow, however, that current principles of international law extend liability—civil or criminal—for human-rights violations to corporations or other artificial entities. This is confirmed by the fact that the charters of respective international criminal tribunals often exclude corporations from their jurisdictional reach.

 The Charter for the Nuremberg Tribunal, created by the Allies after World War II, provided that the Tribunal had jurisdiction over natural persons only. See Agreement for Prosecution and Punishment of Major War Criminals of the European Axis, Art. 6, Aug. 8, 1945, 59 Stat. 1547, E. A. S. 472. Later, a United States Military Tribunal prosecuted 24 executives of the German corporation IG Farben. 7 [*34]  Trials of War Criminals Before the Nuernberg Military Tribunals Under Control Council Law No. 10, pp. 11-60 (1952) (The Farben Case). Among other crimes, Farben’s employees had operated a slave-labor camp at Auschwitz and “knowingly and intentionally manufactured and provided” the poison gas used in the Nazi death chambers. Kiobel, 621 F. 3d, at 135. Although the Military Tribunal “used the term ‘Farben’ as descriptive of the instrumentality of cohesion in the name of which” the crimes were committed, the Tribunal noted that “corporations act through individuals.” 8 The Farben Case, at 1153. Farben itself was not held liable. See ibid.

 The jurisdictional reach of more recent international tribunals also has been limited to “natural persons.” See Statute of the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia, S. C. Res. 827 (May 25, 1993), adopting U. N. Secretary-General Rep. Pursuant to Paragraph 2 of Security Council Resolution 808, Art. 6, U. N. Doc. S/25704 (May 3, 1993); Statute of the International Tribunal for Rwanda, Art. 5, S. C. Res. 955, Art. 5 (Nov. 8, 1994). The Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, for example, limits that tribunal’s jurisdiction to “natural persons.” See [*35]  Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, Art. 25(1), July 17, 1998, 2187 U. N. T. S. 90. The drafters of the Rome Statute considered, but rejected, a proposal to give the International Criminal Court jurisdiction over corporations. Eser, Individual Criminal Responsibility, in 1 Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court 767, 778-779 (A. Cassese et al. eds. 2002).

 The international community’s conscious decision to limit the authority of these international tribunals to natural persons counsels against a broad holding that there is a specific, universal, and obligatory norm of corporate liability under currently prevailing international law.

2

 In light of the sources just discussed, the sources petitioners rely on to support their contention that liability for corporations is well established as a matter of international law lend weak support to their position.

 Petitioners first point to the International Convention for the Suppression of the Financing of Terrorism. This Convention imposes an obligation on “Each State Party” “to enable a legal entity located in its territory or organized under its laws to be held liable when a person responsible for the management or control [*36]  of that legal entity has, in that capacity,” violated the Convention. International Convention for the Suppression of the Financing of Terrorism, Dec. 9, 1999, S. Treaty Doc. No. 106-49, 2178 U. N. T. S. 232. But by its terms the Convention imposes its obligations only on nation-states “to enable” corporations to be held liable in certain circumstances under domestic law. The United States and other nations, including Jordan, may fulfill their obligations under the Convention by adopting detailed regulatory regimes governing financial institutions. See, e.g., 18 U. S. C. §2333(a) (private right of action under the Anti-Terrorism Act); 31 U. S. C. §5311 et seq. (Bank Secrecy Act); 31 CFR pt. 595 (2017) (Terrorism Sanctions Regulations); Brief for Central Bank of Jordan as Amicus Curiae 5 (describing Jordan’s “comprehensive approach to preventing money laundering and terrorist financing”). The Convention neither requires nor authorizes courts, without congressional authorization, to displace those detailed regulatory regimes by allowing common-law actions under the ATS. And nothing in the Convention’s text requires signatories to hold corporations liable in common-law tort actions raising claims under international law.

 In addition, [*37]  petitioners and their amici cite a few cases from other nations and the Special Tribunal for Lebanon that, according to petitioners, are examples of corporations being held liable for violations of international law. E.g., Brief for Petitioners 50-51. Yet even assuming that these cases are relevant examples, at most they demonstrate that corporate liability might be permissible under international law in some circumstances. That falls far short of establishing a specific, universal, and obligatory norm of corporate liability.

 It must be remembered that international law is distinct from domestic law in its domain as well as its objectives. International human-rights norms prohibit acts repugnant to all civilized peoples—crimes like genocide, torture, and slavery, that make their perpetrators “enem[ies] of all mankind.” Sosa, 542 U. S., at 732 (internal quotation marks omitted). In the American legal system, of course, corporations are often subject to liability for the conduct of their human employees, and so it may seem necessary and natural that corporate entities are liable for violations of international law under the ATS. It is true, furthermore, that the enormity of the offenses that can be committed [*38]  against persons in violation of international human-rights protections can be cited to show that corporations should be subject to liability for the crimes of their human agents. But the international community has not yet taken that step, at least in the specific, universal, and obligatory manner required by Sosa. Indeed, there is precedent to the contrary in the statement during the Nuremberg proceedings that “[c]rimes against international law are committed by men, not by abstract entities, and only by punishing individuals who commit such crimes can the provisions of international law be enforced.” The Nurnberg Trial, 6 F. R. D. 69, 110 (1946).

 Petitioners also contend that international law leaves questions of remedies open for determination under domestic law. As they see it, corporate liability is a remedial consideration, not a substantive principle that must be supported by a universal and obligatory norm if it is to be implemented under the ATS. According to petitioners, footnote 20 in Sosa does no more than recognize the distinction in international law between state and private actors. But, as just explained, there is a similar distinction in international law between corporations and natural persons. And it is far [*39]  from obvious why the question whether corporations may be held liable for the international crimes of their employees is a mere question of remedy.

 In any event, the Court need not resolve the questions whether corporate liability is a question that is governed by international law, or, if so, whether international law imposes liability on corporations. There is at least sufficient doubt on the point to turn to Sosa’s second question—whether the Judiciary must defer to Congress, allowing it to determine in the first instance whether that universal norm has been recognized and, if so, whether it is prudent and necessary to direct its enforcement in suits under the ATS.

B

1

 Sosa is consistent with this Court’s general reluctance to extend judicially created private rights of action. The Court’s recent precedents cast doubt on the authority of courts to extend or create private causes of action even in the realm of domestic law, where this Court has “recently and repeatedly said that a decision to create a private right of action is one better left to legislative judgment in the great majority of cases.” 542 U. S., at 727 (citing Correctional Services Corp. v. Malesko, 534 U. S. 61, 68 (2001); Alexander v. Sandoval, 532 U. S. 275, 286-287 (2001)). That is because “the Legislature is in the better position to consider [*40]  if the public interest would be served by imposing a new substantive legal liability.” Ziglar v. Abbasi, 582 U. S. ___, ___ (2017) (slip op., at 12) (internal quotation marks omitted). Thus, “if there are sound reasons to think Congress might doubt the efficacy or necessity of a damages remedy, . . . courts must refrain from creating the remedy in order to respect the role of Congress.” Id., at ___ (slip op., at 13).

 This caution extends to the question whether the courts should exercise the judicial authority to mandate a rule that imposes liability upon artificial entities like corporations. Thus, in Malesko the Court held that corporate defendants may not be held liable in Bivens actions. See Bivens v. Six Unknown Fed. Narcotics Agents, 403 U. S. 388 (1971). Allowing corporate liability would have been a “marked extension” of Bivens that was unnecessary to advance its purpose of holding individual officers responsible for “engaging in unconstitutional wrongdoing.” Malesko, 534 U. S., at 74. Whether corporate defendants should be subject to suit was “a question for Congress, not us, to decide.” Id., at 72.

 Neither the language of the ATS nor the precedents interpreting it support an exception to these general principles in this context. In fact, the separation-of-powers concerns that counsel against courts creating private rights of action apply with particular [*41]  force in the context of the ATS. See infra, at 25-26. The political branches, not the Judiciary, have the responsibility and institutional capacity to weigh foreign-policy concerns. See Kiobel, 569 U. S., at 116-117. That the ATS implicates foreign relations “is itself a reason for a high bar to new private causes of action for violating international law.” Sosa, supra, at 727.

 In Sosa, the Court emphasized that federal courts must exercise “great caution” before recognizing new forms of liability under the ATS. 542 U. S., at 728. In light of the foreign-policy and separation-of-powers concerns inherent in ATS litigation, there is an argument that a proper application of Sosa would preclude courts from ever recognizing any new causes of action under the ATS. But the Court need not resolve that question in this case. Either way, absent further action from Congress it would be inappropriate for courts to extend ATS liability to foreign corporations.

2

 Even in areas less fraught with foreign-policy consequences, the Court looks to analogous statutes for guidance on the appropriate boundaries of judge-made causes of action. See, e.g., Miles v. Apex Marine Corp., 498 U. S. 19, 24 (1990); Blue Chip Stamps v. Manor Drug Stores, 421 U. S. 723, 736 (1975). Doing so is even more important in the realm of international law, where “the general practice has been to look for legislative [*42]  guidance before exercising innovative authority over substantive law.” Sosa, supra, at 726.

 Here, the logical place to look for a statutory analogy to an ATS common-law action is the TVPA—the only cause of action under the ATS created by Congress rather than the courts. As explained above, Congress drafted the TVPA to “establish an unambiguous and modern basis for a cause of action” under the ATS. H. R. Rep., at 3; S. Rep., at 4-5. Congress took care to delineate the TVPA’s boundaries. In doing so, it could weigh the foreign-policy implications of its rule. Among other things, Congress specified who may be liable, created an exhaustion requirement, and established a limitations period. Kiobel, 569 U. S., at 117. In Kiobel, the Court recognized that “[e]ach of these decisions carries with it significant foreign policy implications.” Ibid. The TVPA reflects Congress’ considered judgment of the proper structure for a right of action under the ATS. Absent a compelling justification, courts should not deviate from that model.

 The key feature of the TVPA for this case is that it limits liability to “individuals,” which, the Court has held, unambiguously limits liability to natural persons.

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