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NOTICE: This opinion is subject to formal revision before publication in the
preliminary print of the United States Reports.  Readers are requested to
notify the Reporter of Decisions, Supreme Court of the United States, Wash-
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SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES
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No. 91-1538
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SANDRA JEAN SMITH, PETITIONER v.
UNITED STATES
on writ of certiorari to the united states court
of appeals for the ninth circuit
[March 8, 1993]

  Chief Justice Rehnquist delivered the opinion of the
Court.
  This case presents the question whether the Federal
Tort Claims Act (FTCA), 28 U. S. C. 1346(b), 1402(b),
2401(b), 2671-2680 (1988 ed. and Supp. II), applies to
tortious acts or omissions occurring in Antarctica, a
sovereignless region without civil tort law of its own.
We hold that it does not.
  Petitioner Sandra Jean Smith is the widow of John
Emmett Smith and the duly appointed representative of
his estate.  At the time of his death, Smith worked as a
carpenter at McMurdo Station on Ross Island, Antarctica,
for a construction company under contract to the National
Science Foundation, an agency of the United States.
Smith and two companions one day took a recreational
hike to Castle Rock, located several miles outside of
McMurdo Station.  On their return, they departed from
the marked route to walk across a snow field in the
direction of Scott Base, a New Zealand outpost not far
from McMurdo Station.  After stopping for a snack, one
of the three men took a step and suddenly dropped from
sight.  Smith followed, and he, too, disappeared.  Both
men had fallen into a crevasse.  Despite search and
rescue efforts, Smith died from exposure and internal
injuries suffered as a result of the fall.
  Petitioner filed this wrongful death action against the
United States under the FTCA in the District Court for
the District of Oregon, the district where she resides.
Petitioner alleged that the United States was negligent in
failing to provide adequate warning of the dangers posed
by crevasses in areas beyond the marked paths.  It is
undisputed that petitioner's claim is based exclusively on
acts or omissions occurring in Antarctica.  Upon the
motion of the United States, the District Court dismissed
petitioner's complaint for lack of subject-matter jurisdic-
tion, 702 F. Supp. 1480 (1989), holding that her claim was
barred by 28 U. S. C. 2680(k), the foreign-country
exception.  Section 2680(k) precludes the exercise of
jurisdiction over -[a]ny claim arising in a foreign country.-
  The Court of Appeals affirmed, 953 F. 2d 1116 (CA9
1991).  It noted that the term -foreign country- admits of
multiple interpretations, and thus looked to the language
and structure of the FTCA as a whole to determine
whether Antarctica is a -foreign country- within the
meaning of the statute.  Adopting the analysis and
conclusion of then-Judge Scalia, see Beattie v. United
States, 244 U. S. App. D. C. 70, 85-109, 756 F. 2d 91,
106-130 (1984) (Scalia, J., dissenting), the Court of
Appeals ruled that the FTCA does not apply to claims
arising in Antarctica.  To hold otherwise, the Court of
Appeals stated, would render two other provisions of the
FTCA, 28 U. S. C. 1402(b), 1346(b), nonsensical.  The
Court of Appeals held, in the alternative, that petitioner's
suit would be barred even if Antarctica were not a
-foreign country- for purposes of the FTCA.  Because the
FTCA was a limited relinquishment of the common-law
immunity of the United States, the Court of Appeals
concluded that the absence of any clear congressional
intent to subject the United States to liability for claims
arising in Antarctica precluded petitioner's suit.  We
granted certiorari to resolve a conflict between two Courts
of Appeals, 504 U. S. -- (1992), and now affirm.
  Petitioner argues that the scope of the foreign-country
exception turns on whether the United States has recog-
nized the legitimacy of another nation's sovereign claim
over the foreign land.  Otherwise, she contends, the land
is not a -country- for purposes of the FTCA.  Petitioner
points out that the United States does not recognize the
validity of other nations' claims to portions of Antarctica.
She asserts, moreover, that this construction of the term
-foreign country- is most consistent with the purpose
underlying the foreign-country exception.  According to
petitioner, Congress enacted the foreign-country exception
in order to insulate the United States from tort liability
imposed pursuant to foreign law.  Because Antarctica has
no law of its own, petitioner claims that conventional
choice-of-law rules control and require the application of
Oregon law, the law of her domicile.  Thus, petitioner
concludes, the rationale for the foreign-country exception
would not be compromised by the exercise of jurisdiction
here, since the United States would not be subject to
liability under the law of a foreign nation.
  Petitioner's argument for governmental liability here
faces significant obstacles in addition to the foreign-
country exception, but we turn first to the language of
that proviso.  It states that the FTCA's waiver of sover-
eign immunity does not apply to -[a]ny claim arising in
a foreign country.-  28 U. S. C. 2680(k).  Though the
FTCA offers no definition of -country,- the commonsense
meaning of the term undermines petitioner's attempt to
equate it with -sovereign state.-  The first dictionary
definition of -country- is simply -[a] region or tract of
land.-  Webster's New International Dictionary 609 (2d ed.
1945).  To be sure, this is not the only possible interpreta-
tion of the term, and it is therefore appropriate to exam-
ine other parts of the statute before making a final
determination.  But the ordinary meaning of the language
itself, we think, includes Antarctica, even though it has
no recognized government.
  Our construction of the term -foreign country- draws
support from the language of 1346(b), -[t]he principal
provision of the Federal Tort Claims Act.-  Richards v.
United States, 369 U. S. 1, 6 (1962).  That section waives
the sovereign immunity of the United States for certain
torts committed by federal employees -under circumstances
where the United States, if a private person, would be
liable to the claimant in accordance with the law of the
place where the act or omission occurred.-  28 U. S. C.
1346(b) (emphasis added).  We have construed 1346(b)
in determining what law should apply in actions brought
under the FTCA.  See Richards, supra.  But by its terms
the section is more than a choice-of-law provision: it
delineates the scope of the United States' waiver of
sovereign immunity.  If Antarctica were not a -foreign
country,- and for that reason included within the FTCA's
coverage, 1346(b) would instruct courts to look to the law
of a place that has no law in order to determine the
liability of the United States-surely a bizarre result.
Of course, if it were quite clear from the balance of the
statute that governmental liability was intended for torts
committed in Antarctica, then the failure of 1346(b) to
specify any governing law might be treated as a statutory
gap that the courts could fill by decisional law.  But
coupled with what seems to us the most natural interpre-
tation of the foreign-country exception, this portion of
1346(b) reinforces the conclusion that Antarctica is
excluded from the coverage of the FTCA.
  Section 1346(b) is not, however, the only FTCA provi-
sion that contradicts petitioner's interpretation of the
foreign-country exception.  The statute's venue provision,
1402(b), provides that claims under the FTCA may be
brought -only in the judicial district where the plaintiff
resides or wherein the act or omission complained of
occurred.-  Because no federal judicial district encompasses
Antarctica, petitioner's interpretation of the FTCA would
lead to yet another anomalous result:  the FTCA would
establish jurisdiction for all tort claims against the United
States arising in Antarctica, but no venue would exist
unless the claimant happened to reside in the United
States.  As we observed in Brunette Machine Works, Ltd.
v. Kockum Industries, Inc., 406 U. S. 706, 710, n. 8
(1972), -Congress does not in general intend to create
venue gaps, which take away with one hand what Con-
gress has given by way of jurisdictional grant with the
other.-  Thus, in construing the FTCA, it is -reasonable
to prefer the construction that avoids leaving such a gap,-
ibid., especially when that construction comports with the
usual meaning of a disputed term.
  Our decisions interpreting the FTCA contain varying
statements as to how it should be construed.  See, e.g.,
United States v. Yellow Cab Co., 340 U. S. 543, 547
(1951); Dalehite v. United States, 346 U. S. 15, 31 (1953);
United States v. Orleans, 425 U. S. 807, 813 (1976); Kosak
v. United States, 465 U. S. 848, 853, n. 9 (1984).  See also
United States v. Nordic Village, Inc., -- U. S. --, --
(1992).  A recent statement of this sort, and the one to
which we now adhere, is found in United States v.
Kubrick, 444 U. S. 111, 117-118 (1979):  -We should also
have in mind that the Act waives the immunity of the
United States and that . . . we should not take it upon
ourselves to extend the waiver beyond that which Con-
gress intended.  [Citations omitted.]  Neither, however,
should we assume the authority to narrow the waiver that
Congress intended.-  Reading the foreign-country exception
to the FTCA to exclude torts committed in Antarctica
accords with this canon of construction.
  Lastly, the presumption against extraterritorial applica-
tion of United States statutes requires that any lingering
doubt regarding the reach of the FTCA be resolved
against its encompassing torts committed in Antarctica.
-It is a longstanding principle of American law `that
legislation of Congress, unless a contrary intent appears,
is meant to apply only within the territorial jurisdiction
of the United States.'-  EEOC v. Arabian American Oil
Co., 499 U. S. --, -- (1991) (quoting Foley Bros., Inc.
v. Filardo, 336 U. S. 281, 285 (1949)).  In applying this
principle, -[w]e assume that Congress legislates against
the backdrop of the presumption against extraterritori-
ality.-  Arabian American Oil Co., supra, at --; accord,
e.g., Argentine Republic v. Amerada Hess Shipping Corp.,
488 U. S. 428, 440 (1989) (-When it desires to do so,
Congress knows how to place the high seas within the
jurisdictional reach of a statute-).  The applicability of the
presumption is not defeated here just because the FTCA
specifically addresses the issue of extraterritorial applica-
tion in the foreign-country exception.  To the contrary, as
we stated in United States v. Spelar, 338 U. S. 217, 222
(1949), -[t]hat presumption, far from being overcome here,
is doubly fortified by the language of this statute and the
legislative purpose underlying it.-  Petitioner does not
assert, nor could she, that there is clear evidence of
congressional intent to apply the FTCA to claims arising
in Antarctica.
  For all of these reasons, we hold that the FTCA's
waiver of sovereign immunity does not apply to tort
claims arising in Antarctica.  Some of these reasons are
based on the language and structure of the statute itself;
others are based on presumptions as to extraterritorial
application of Acts of Congress and as to waivers of
sovereign immunity.  We think these norms of statutory
construction have quite likely led us to the same conclu-
sion that the 79th Congress would have reached had it
expressly considered the question we now decide:  it would
not have included a desolate and extraordinarily danger-
ous land such as Antarctica within the scope of the FTCA.
The judgment of the Court of Appeals is therefore

Affirmed.