§ 35.002.Short Title

A short title, and the word that matters in it is "uniform".

This chapter may be cited as the Uniform Enforcement of Foreign Judgments Act.

The act is one of the most widely adopted uniform laws in the country, in force in the great majority of states — which is what makes it work.

A judgment creditor moving a judgment across state lines meets the same procedure wherever they go: file an authenticated copy, file an affidavit of addresses, mail notice, and the judgment is enforceable as a local one.

Uniformity matters more here than in most subjects. A creditor chasing a debtor’s assets in four states cannot learn four filing regimes for each collection, and a debtor is entitled to know what to expect.

Being a uniform act also affects how the chapter is read. Decisions from other adopting states interpreting the same language carry weight they would not have on a purely local statute.

The title names enforcement rather than recognition, which is precise. Recognition of a sister-state judgment is required by the constitution; what the act supplies is the mechanism for enforcing it.

The companion chapter takes the opposite name for the opposite reason — it is a recognition act, because recognition is exactly what is in question for a judgment from another country.

Reading the two titles side by side is the quickest way to see the difference between the chapters.