The court was originally headquartered in the American Consulate General building on Huangpu Road in the Shanghai International Settlement, with additional sessions held at least annually in the Chinese cities of Guangzhou, Tianjin, and Hankou.

[8] The U.S. consular courts in China retained limited jurisdiction, including civil cases where property involved in the controversy did not exceed $500 and criminal cases where the punishment did not exceed $100 in fines or 60 days' imprisonment.

[note 1] As a result, Judge Lobingier would later hold that "there can be no half way adoption of that doctrine; it includes all such laws or none.

[21] This was in contrast to the situation in the States, where civil procedure in actions at law (i.e., most lawsuits for monetary damages) in U.S. federal courts was normally provided for by state law, by virtue of the Conformity Act of 1872,[22] until the promulgation of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure in 1938.

[23] The United States Consulate and Court in Shanghai were occupied by the Japanese on December 8, 1941, at the beginning of the Pacific War.

[24] Americans continued to enjoy extraterritorial rights in those parts of China not occupied by the Japanese.

Boatner Carney of the Flying Tigers was prosecuted for manslaughter before Special Judge Bertrand E. Johnson.