No. 5-99-0830 IN THE APPELLATE COURT OF ... - Appellate.net

of Illinois. Not surprisingly, state and federal courts alike have emphatically rejected the
precise argument accepted here. In Oliveira, for example, the plaintiff argued that ICFA
applied nationwide because “the idea for the deceptive advertising campaign originated in
Illinois where defendant had its corporate headquarters.” Oliveira, 311 Ill.App.3d 886, 726
N.E.2d at 61. The Fourth District soundly rejected that argument, explaining:
[T]he suggestion [that] defendant’s fraud scheme “emanated” from employees of
defendant in Illinois does not constitute trade or commerce affecting Illinois
consumers. The Act does not seek to punish evil thoughts but actual deceptive acts
and practices.
Id. Accord Rohlfing v. Manor Care, Inc., 172 F.R.D. 330, 340 & n.10 (N.D. Ill. 1997)
(“where the only connection with Illinois is the headquarters of one defendant, . . . the ICFA
does not apply to the claims of the non-Illinois plaintiffs”; ICFA does not apply to claims
by non-Illinois residents “merely because a scheme ‘emanated’ from the minds of persons
in Illinois”); Hastings v. Fidelity Mortgage Decisions Corp., 984 F. Supp. 600, 615 (N.D.
Ill. 1997); Peters v. Northern Trust Co., 1999 WL 515481, at *14 (N.D. Ill. 1999).
Plaintiffs’ theory also is inconsistent with the long-established proposition that
corporations “do not carry with them” their home state’s law “when they go to other
jurisdictions to do business.” Warren v. First Nat’l Bank, 149 Ill. 9, 27 (1893). This
principle has particular force in the context of insurance transactions because “the various
States have enacted laws relative to the licensing of foreign insurance companies to transact
business therein, and as a matter of public policy such companies under such circumstances,
having authorized agents to solicit business, must be held to transact such business under the
members’ claims if they had sufficient contacts with Illinois.
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