upon June 7.

upon June 7, the US. leading Court ruled in a 6 to 3 decision that Maria Altmann, an 88-year-old looks Angeles resident, has the right to follow up the Austrian government for the recuperation of six important paintings by the agency of Gustav Klimt. The decision upheld earlier rulings by dint of lower courts granting Altmann the right to prosecute Austria in the US. Justice John Paul Steven who l the majority, denied asks by Austria and the Bush administration to dismiss Altmann's claim. The three dissenters were Chief Justice William Rennquist and Justices Anthony Kennedy and Clarence Thomas.

At the heart of the network case is the 1976 Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act, a law which generally assigns foreign governments immune from suits in U courts, object when property has been taken in violation of international law. It was the position of Altmann's lawyer, E Randol Schoenberg, that Austria's seizure of the paintings qualifies retroactively for like an exception.

The paintings, which today hang in the Austrian Gallery in Vienna and are estimated to be worth $150 million, belonged to Ferdinand Bloch-Bauer, Altmann's uncle In 1939 the works, including the famous Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer (1907) were seized by means of the Nazis. Following the war, Altmann vies the Austrian government pressured the Bloch-Bauer family to relinquish ownership of the paintings in exchange for permission to take other works without of the country. Her earlier efforts to solicit in Austrian courts were stymied by way of the requirement that she pay $2 million in filing rewards [see "Artworld," Nov. '03].

When the case turn backs to trial in a lower court in California (no date has been fix at press time), the State Department can still beg that it be dismissed forward the grounds that it interferes with national interest. In a telephone interview with Bloomberg moderns after the Supreme Court ruling, Altmann declared: "I'm self-same very happy. I have a feeling they will now have to proceed to the table and talk."

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