§ 36A.003.Applicability

The threshold provision, and it has an inclusion, three exclusions and a burden rule.

The chapter applies to a foreign-country judgment to the extent that it grants or denies recovery of a sum of money and, under the law of the foreign country, is final, conclusive, and enforceable.

"To the extent that" allows a judgment to be split. A judgment ordering money and also granting an injunction falls within the chapter as to the money and outside it as to the rest.

"Denies recovery" is easy to overlook and matters a great deal. A defendant who won abroad can have that judgment recognized here, which is what prevents the claimant relitigating the same claim in Texas.

Finality is measured by the law of the rendering country, not by Texas notions of finality — so a judgment subject to a form of review unknown here may still qualify, and one final in appearance may not.

Three categories are excluded.

A judgment for taxes. Courts have long declined to enforce another sovereign’s revenue claims, and the exclusion carries that rule forward.

A fine or other penalty. The same reasoning applies to penal judgments: enforcing them would put Texas courts to work executing another country’s public law.

A judgment for divorce, support, or maintenance, or other judgment rendered in connection with domestic relations. Those are governed by their own statutes and conventions, which are built for the continuing supervision family matters require.

A party seeking recognition has the burden of establishing that the chapter applies.

That allocation is the first of two in the chapter. The proponent proves the chapter applies; the opponent then proves a ground for nonrecognition.