Section 6 of the Federal Employers' Liability Act prevents a
state court from enjoining, on the ground of the inconvenience or
expense to the railroad, a resident citizen of the State from
prosecuting or furthering an action under the Act (or receiving the
proceeds of any judgment therein) in a state court of another State
which has jurisdiction under the Act. P.
315 U. S.
705.
Reversed.
Certiorari, 314 U.S. 602, to review a decree of injunction. The
highest court of the State had refused a review by certiorari.
Page 315 U. S. 699
MR. JUSTICE REED delivered the opinion of the Court.
The effect of section 6 of the Federal Employers' Liability Act
[
Footnote 1] on the power of a
state court to enjoin its citizens, on the ground of oppressiveness
and inequity to the defendant carrier, from suing on a FELA claim
in the state courts of another state, furthering such a suit in any
manner, or receiving the proceeds of any judgment so obtained, is
before us for decision.
The respondent, an Illinois corporation, hereafter referred to
as the Illinois Central, brought an original bill in the Chancery
Court of Shelby County, Tennessee, seeking to enjoin one of the
petitioners here, Mrs. Miles, then the Tennessee administratrix of
her husband, a resident of that State, from further prosecuting in
a Missouri state court her FELA claim against the Illinois Central
for the death of her husband, its employee. The fatal accident had
occurred at Memphis, Tennessee. After a temporary injunction
issued, Mrs. Miles promptly dismissed her Missouri suit and was
discharged as administratrix by
Page 315 U. S. 700
the Tennessee probate court. A Missouri administrator was then
appointed at her suggestion, and he instituted another Missouri
suit for the same cause of action. The Illinois Central filed an
amended and supplemental bill, adding decedent's children, likewise
residents of Tennessee, as defendants and enlarging its prayer to
forbid furthering the new suit in any manner or receiving the
proceeds of any judgment. A new temporary injunction was issued as
prayed.
The grounds for the injunction were the inconvenience and
expense to the Illinois Central of taking its Memphis employees to
St. Louis, and the resulting burden upon interstate commerce. The
anticipated extra expense was several hundred dollars per day for
an estimated two days of actual trial and whatever additional time
might be lost by continuances or delay. Inconvenience was expected
through the withdrawal of some twelve to twenty employees and
officials from their duties for the same period. The defense relied
upon a timely plea that section 6 of the FELA prevented the
enjoining of proceedings in the Missouri courts.
The trial court found that the continued prosecution of the
pending Missouri case would be "oppressive and inequitable" to the
Illinois Central and "a burden on the commerce and business of the
complainant." As a matter of law, the court concluded, however,
that the Illinois Central was not entitled to permanent
injunctions. On appeal, the Court of Appeals reversed the decree
and made the temporary injunctions permanent. Further state review
by certiorari in the Supreme Court of Tennessee was refused, and we
granted certiorari to the Court of Appeals to settle an important
federal question [
Footnote 2]
as to the applicability
Page 315 U. S. 701
of section 6 of the FELA to this situation. 314 U.S. 602.
Cf. Payne v. Knapp, 197 Iowa 737, 198 N.W. 62;
Peterson v. Chicago, B. & Q. R. Co., 187 Minn. 228,
244 N.W. 823;
Baltimore & O. R. Co. v. Kepner, 137
Ohio St. 409, 30 N.E.2d 982,
aff'd, 314 U. S. 314 U.S.
44.
The
Kepner case dealt with the power of a state court
to enjoin a resident from continued prosecution of a suit under the
FELA in a distant federal district court on the ground of inequity,
vexatiousness, and harassment. The decision denied the power to
interfere with the privileges of federal venue "for the benefit of
the carrier or the national transportation system."
As in the
Kepner case, there is in this case no
occasion to go into the question of the availability as support for
an injunction of a charge of interference with interstate commerce
by reason of the burden of expense and inconvenience. The trial
court found a burden on the commerce of the Illinois Central, but
made no finding as to any burden on interstate commerce. Moreover,
the Court of Appeals stated that the Illinois Central "expressly
abandoned the contention" "that the prosecution of the suit in St.
Louis was a burden on interstate commerce." No contention is made
here that there is any such burden, or that the Illinois Central is
not doing substantial business in Missouri, as found by the trial
court. It operates daily passenger trains with its own crews into
St. Louis over the St. Louis Terminal Company tracks, maintains
passenger and freight offices, and had total receipts in St. Louis
of a million and a half the year the suit was filed. Under the rule
announced in
Denver & R.G.W. R. Co. v. Terte,
284 U. S. 284,
284 U. S. 287,
the Illinois Central is properly suable in Missouri. In the
Kepner case,
314 U. S. 314 U.S.
44,
314 U. S. 51, we
pointed out, with a discussion of the applicable cases, that the
carrier must submit to inconvenience and expense if there is
jurisdiction, "although thereby interstate commerce is
incidentally
Page 315 U. S. 702
burdened." There is no occasion to repeat the comments here. The
specific declaration in section 6 that the United States courts
should have concurrent jurisdiction with those of the several
states and the prohibition against removal point clearly to the
conclusion that Congress has exercised its authority over
interstate commerce to the extent of permitting suits in state
courts, despite the incidental burden, where process may be
obtained on a defendant, not merely soliciting business but
actually carrying on railroading by operating trains and
maintaining traffic offices within the territory of the court's
jurisdiction. [
Footnote 3]
The real point of controversy here is whether that portion of
section 6 of the FELA which holds litigation in the state court
where it is instituted prevents the court of another state from
enjoining citizens, within its jurisdiction, from continued
prosecution of the suit on grounds of inequity. Here, as in
Kepner's case, there is no question but what the Missouri
court has venue of the proceeding. Here, too, we need to look no
farther into Tennessee law than the opinion of the state's highest
court in this record to conclude that, under state law, a court of
equity may enjoin a resident citizen from attempting to enforce his
rights, oppressively and inequitably, [
Footnote 4] and that the expense and inconvenience
hereinbefore set out resulted in oppressiveness and inconvenience
in the eye of the state court.
Page 315 U. S. 703
In the legislative history of section 6, [
Footnote 5] the provision that removal may not be
had from a "State court of competent jurisdiction" was added to the
House bill on the floor of the Senate, and later accepted by the
House, in order to assure a hearing to the employee in a state
court. Words were simultaneously adopted recognizing the
jurisdiction of the state courts by providing that the federal
jurisdiction should be concurrent. The venue of state court suits
was left to the practice of the forum. The opportunity to present
causes of action arising under the FELA in the state courts came,
however, not from the state law, but from the federal. By virtue of
the Constitution, the courts of the several states must remain open
to such litigants on the same basis that they are open to litigants
with causes of action springing from a different source. This is so
because the Federal Constitution makes the laws of the United
States the supreme law of
Page 315 U. S. 704
the land, binding on every citizen and every court and
enforceable wherever jurisdiction is adequate for the purpose.
Second Employers' Liability Cases, 223 U. S.
1,
223 U. S. 56-59.
The Missouri court here involved must permit this litigation. To
deny citizens from other states, suitors under FELA, access to its
courts would, if it permitted access to its own citizens, violate
the Privileges and Immunities Clause. Constitution, Art. IV, § 2;
McKnett v. St. Louis & S.F. Ry. Co., 292 U.
S. 230,
292 U. S. 233.
[
Footnote 6] Since the
existence of the cause of action and the privilege of vindicating
rights under the FELA in state courts spring from federal law, the
right to use in state courts of proper venue where their
jurisdiction is adequate is of the same quality as the right of sue
in federal courts. It is no more subject to interference by state
action than was the federal venue in the
Kepner case.
This is not to say that states cannot control their courts. We
do not deal here with the power of Missouri, by judicial decision
or legislative enactment, to regulate the use of its courts
generally as was approved in the
Douglas or the
Chambers cases,
note 6
supra. We are considering another state's power to so
control its own citizens that they cannot exercise the federal
privilege of litigating a federal right in the court of another
state.
Page 315 U. S. 705
State courts have assumed the right to enjoin their citizens
from proceeding in the courts of other states. This was done, for
example, in
Reed's Administratrix v. Illinois Central R.
Co., 182 Ky. 455, 206 S.W. 794. The basis of the decision was
the inequity of allowing a suit at a distant point in a state or
federal court, page 464. [
Footnote
7]
Reed's case was relied upon by
Kern v.
Cleveland, C., C.& St.L. Ry., 204 Ind. 595, 185 N.E. 446,
for the authority of a state court to enjoin its citizens from
inequitable conduct under the FELA. Other state courts deny their
authority to issue such injunctions. [
Footnote 8]
The permission granted by Congress to sue in state courts may be
exercised only where the carrier is found doing business. If suits
in federal district courts at those points do not unduly burden
interstate commerce, suits in similarly located state courts cannot
be burdensome. As Congress has permitted both the state and federal
suits, its determination that the carriers must bear the incidental
burden is a determination that the state courts may not treat the
normal expense and inconvenience of trial in permitted places, such
as the one selected here, as inequitable and unconscionable.
The judgment below is reversed, and the cause is remanded to the
Court of Appeals of Tennessee for further proceedings not
inconsistent with this opinion.
Reversed.
[
Footnote 1]
36 Stat. 291.
"SEC. 6. That no action shall be maintained under this Act
unless commenced within two years from the day the cause of action
accrued."
"Under this Act, an action may be brought in a district court of
the United States, in the district of the residence of the
defendant, or in which the cause of action arose, or in which the
defendant shall be doing business at the time of commencing such
action. The jurisdiction of the courts of the United States under
this Act shall be concurrent with that of the courts of the several
States, and no case arising under this Act and brought in any State
court of competent jurisdiction shall be removed to any court of
the United States."
45 U.S.C. § 56.
[
Footnote 2]
Judicial Code § 237(b).
Southern Ry. Co. v. Painter,
314 U. S. 155,
314 U. S.
159-160: "If a state court proceeds as the Chancery
Court of Tennessee acted, the ultimate vindication of any federal
right lies with this Court."
Baltimore & Ohio R. Co. v.
Kepner, 314 U. S. 44,
314 U. S.
52.
[
Footnote 3]
Hoffman v. Missouri ex rel. Foraker, 274 U. S.
21.
Cf. International Milling Co. v. Columbia
Co., 292 U. S. 511,
limiting
Davis v. Farmers' Cooperative Co., 262 U.
S. 312;
Atchison Ry. Co. v. Wells, 265 U.
S. 101, and
Michigan Central R. Co. v. Mix,
278 U. S. 492, to
the rule that suits upon extra-state causes of action under FELA
burden commerce and will not be permitted in courts of states where
the defendant carriers do no more than maintain facilities for
solicitation of business. The three cases last mentioned and the
Foraker case were all written by the same justice within
the space of a few years.
[
Footnote 4]
Cf. Chambers v. Baltimore & Ohio R. Co.,
207 U. S. 142,
207 U. S.
149.
[
Footnote 5]
House Resolution 17263, 61st Congress,2d Session, which
eventually became the Act of 1910, contained no prohibition or
restriction upon removal of suits from state courts when it passed
the House, and was reported to the Senate by the Senate Committee
on the Judiciary. Sen.Rep. No. 432, 61st Cong., 2d Sess., March 22,
1910. Upon the floor of the Senate, several amendments were
proposed, varying in terms, but all seeking to achieve some such
limitation. 45 Cong.Rec. 3995, 3998, 4051. Senator Paynter's second
version was the amendment eventually adopted. 45 Cong.Rec. 4093.
The House concurred in the Senate amendment without modification.
45 Cong.Rec. 4159.
The reason for the amendment was stated by Senator Paynter
thus:
"I offer an amendment which will give to the plaintiff the right
to select the forum in which his case shall be tried. He can select
the federal or the state court, as he may prefer, to try his case
arising under the act in question."
P. 4051.
"If this amendment is adopted, the Congress has not conferred by
the act under consideration the exclusive jurisdiction upon state
courts. The plaintiff can choose either the federal or state court
in which to prosecute his action. The effect of my amendment is to
prevent the removal of the action from the state courts when
brought there."
P. 4093.
[
Footnote 6]
Chambers v. Baltimore & Ohio R. Co., 207 U.
S. 142, or
Douglas v. New York, N.H. R. Co.,
279 U. S. 377, do
not impinge upon this principle. In the former case, an Ohio
statute forbade suits in its courts for wrongful death occurring in
another state unless the decedent was a citizen of Ohio. This Court
saw no discrimination against personal representatives of any
decedent, since their right to sue did not depend upon their
citizenship, but upon the citizenship of their decedent. In the
latter case, a statute of New York which gave only discretionary
jurisdiction to suits by nonresidents but compulsory jurisdiction
to suits by residents was held valid because it treated citizens
and noncitizens alike, and tested their right to maintain an action
by their residence or nonresidence.
[
Footnote 7]
This is not the position of the federal courts.
Connelly v.
Central R. Co., 238 F. 932;
Schendel v. McGee, 300 F.
273, 278;
Chesapeake & Ohio Ry. Co. v. Vigor, 90 F.2d
7.
[
Footnote 8]
Missouri-Kansas-Texas R Co. v. Ball, 126 Kan. 745, 271
P. 313;
Mobile & Ohio R. Co. v. Parrent, 260 Ill.App.
284;
Lancaster v. Dunn, 153 La. 15, 95 So. 385.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON, concurring.
I agree with the conclusion and, with exceptions stated herein,
with the opinion of MR. JUSTICE REED, though I
Page 315 U. S. 706
am not able to sublimate the conflict that underlies this case
to the level of either of the conflicting opinions. Realistically
considered, the issue is earthy and unprincipled. So viewed, the
real issue is whether a plaintiff with a cause of action under the
Federal Employers' Liability Act may go shopping for a judge or a
jury believed to be more favorable than he would find in his home
forum. An advantage which it is hoped will be reflected in a
judgment is what makes plaintiffs leave home and incur burdens of
expense and inconvenience that would be regarded as oppressive if
forced upon them. And that is what makes railroads seek injunctions
such as this one.
The judiciary has never a favored this sort of shopping for a
forum. It has sought to protect its own good name, as well as to
protect defendants by injunctions against the practice of seeking
out soft spots in the judicial system in which to bring particular
kinds of litigation. But the judges, with lawyerly indirection,
have not avowed the interest of the judiciary in orderly resort to
the courts as a basis for their decision, and have cast their
protective doctrines in terms of sheltering defendants against
vexatious and harassing suits. This judicial treatment of the
subject of venue leads Congress and the parties to think of the
choice of a forum as a private matter between litigants, and, in
cases like the present, obscures the public interest in venue
practices behind a rather fantastic fiction that a widow is
harassing the Illinois Central Railroad. If Congress had left us
free to consult the ultimate public interest in orderly resort to
the judicial system, I should agree with MR. JUSTICE FRANKFURTER's
conclusion. But the plaintiffs say that they go shopping not by
leave of the courts themselves, but by the authority of Congress.
Whether the Congress has granted such latitude is our question.
Unless there is some hidden meaning in the language Congress has
employed, the injured workman or his surviving
Page 315 U. S. 707
dependents may choose from the entire territory served by the
railroad any place in which to sue, and in which to choose either a
federal or a state court of which to ask his remedy. There is
nothing which requires a plaintiff to whom such a choice is given
to exercise it in a self-denying or large-hearted manner. There is
nothing to restrain use of that privilege as all choices of
tribunal are commonly used by all plaintiffs to get away from
judges who are considered to be unsympathetic, and to get before
those who are considered more favorable; to get away from juries
thought to be small-minded in the matter of verdicts, and to get to
those thought to be generous; to escape courts whose procedures are
burdensome to the plaintiff and to seek out courts whose procedures
make the going easy.
That such a privilege puts a burden on interstate commerce may
well be admitted, but Congress has the power to burden. The Federal
Employers' Liability Act itself leaves interstate commerce under
the burden of a medieval system of compensating the injured
railroad worker or his survivors. He is not given a remedy, but
only a lawsuit. It is well understood that, in most cases, he will
be unable to pursue that except by splitting his speculative
prospects with a lawyer. The functioning of this backward system of
dealing with industrial accidents in interstate commerce burdens it
with perhaps two dollars of judgment for every dollar that actually
reaches those who have been damaged, and it leaves the burden of
many injuries to be borne by them utterly uncompensated. Such being
the major burden under which the workmen and the industry must
function, I see no reason to believe that Congress could not have
intended the relatively minor additional burden to interstate
commerce from loading the dice a little in favor of the workman in
the matter of venue. It seems more probable that Congress intended
to give the disadvantaged workman some leverage in
Page 315 U. S. 708
the choice of venue than that it intended to leave him in a
position where the railroad could force him to try one lawsuit at
home to find out whether he would be allowed to try his principal
lawsuit elsewhere. This latter would be a frequent result if we
upheld the contention made in this case and in the
Kepner
case. I think, therefore, that the petitioner had a right to resort
to the Missouri court under the circumstances of this case for her
remedy.
I do not, however, agree with the statement in MR. JUSTICE
REED's opinion that "the Missouri court here involved must permit
this litigation." It is very doubtful if any requirement can be
spelled out of the Federal Constitution that a state must furnish a
forum for a nonresident plaintiff and a foreign corporation to
fight out issues imported from another state where the cause of
action arose. It seems unnecessary to decide now whether this
litigation could be imposed on the Missouri court, for it appears
to have embraced the litigation. Even if Missouri, by reason of its
control of its own courts, might refuse to open them to such a
case, it does not follow that another state may close Missouri's
courts to one with a federal cause of action. If Missouri elects to
entertain the case, the courts of no other state can obstruct or
prevent its exercise of jurisdiction as conferred by the federal
statute or its right to obtain evidence and to distribute the
proceeds, if any, in accordance with the Federal Employers'
Liability Act. I therefore favor reversal.
MR. JUSTICE FRANKFURTER, dissenting.
The decision in this case mutilates principles that have long
been regarded as basic in the law. Few legal doctrines have been
more universally accepted than those recognizing the powers which
this Court now denies to the states when suits under the Federal
Employers' Liability Act are brought in state courts: the power of
a court to prevent injustice by restraining a person subject to
its
Page 315 U. S. 709
authority from maintaining an inequitable suit in the courts of
another state,
Cole v. Cunningham, 133 U.
S. 107; the right of a court to decline its facilities
to a suit that, "in the interest of justice," should be tried
elsewhere,
Canada Malting Co. v. Paterson Co.,
285 U. S. 413,
285 U. S.
422-423. The decision disregards the constitutional
relationship between the "judicial power" of the federal government
and that of the states whereby state courts enforce federal rights
(when such remedies have not been exclusively entrusted to the
federal courts) as part of their
"duty to safeguard and enforce the right of every citizen
without reference to the particular exercise of governmental power
from which the right may have arisen."
Minneapolis & St. Louis R. v. Bombolis,
241 U. S. 211,
241 U. S.
222.
For a decision so far-reaching in its implications, warrant is
found in the inarticulate radiations of Section 6 of the 1910
amendment to the Federal Employers' Liability Act. While the words
of a statute do not, by themselves, distil its meaning, we must at
least begin with them. The language of Section 6 is simple and
direct. After establishing a two-year period of limitations, it
continues:
"Under this Act, an action may be brought in a district court of
the United States, in the district of the residence of the
defendant, or in which the cause of action arose, or in which the
defendant shall be doing business at the time of commencing such
action. The jurisdiction of the courts of the United States under
this Act shall be concurrent with that of the courts of the several
States, and no case arising under this Act and brought in any State
court of competent jurisdiction shall be removed to any court of
the United States."
36 Stat. 291.
This is a conventional provision. There is nothing novel or
distinctive about it. Recognition of concurrent jurisdiction in the
state courts to vindicate federal rights is found in the First
Judiciary Act of 1789. 1 Stat. 73, 77.
Page 315 U. S. 710
And the statute books are replete with instances in which
Congress has acknowledged the existence of this jurisdiction in the
state courts unless explicitly withheld from them.
See the
discussion of Mr. Justice Bradley in
Claflin v. Houseman,
93 U. S. 130,
93 U. S. 139,
93 U. S. 143. The
essence of Section 6 is merely that the state courts are open to a
plaintiff suing under the Act, and that, if he chooses to bring
suit in a state court, the defendant may not remove the cause to a
federal court. So far as language conveys ideas , the Act affords
no intimation that Congress intended anything more.
We are not, of course, concerned here, as we were in the
Kepner case decided the other day,
314 U. S.
44, with an attempt by a state court to prevent resort
to a federal court. Historically, the problem of interferences,
direct or indirect, between federal and state courts is entirely
separate from the problem of the relations of the state courts to
each other.
See Warren, Federal and State Court
Interference, 43 Harv.L.Rev. 345. The question now before us --
relating to the power of a state to enjoin those subject to its
jurisdiction from unjustly resorting to the courts of a sister
state -- is an aspect of the latter problem. In the
Kepner
case, this Court held only that the provision of Section 6 "filled
the entire field of venue in federal courts," and that what had
thus been legislatively given to the federal courts could not
judicially be taken away. The
Kepner decision cast no
cloud upon
Douglas v. New York, N.H. R. Co., 279 U.
S. 377, which sustained the power of a state to apply
the principle of
forum non conveniens to suits under the
Act brought in its courts by nonresidents. The issue in the case at
bar is essentially another phase of the problem in the
Douglas case -- whether, merely by authorizing access to
the state courts to enforce rights created by the Federal
Employers' Liability Act, Congress impliedly repealed
pro
tanto the means for
Page 315 U. S. 711
achieving justice which the states customarily employ in similar
cases. Specifically, the question for decision is this: has
Congress, by providing explicitly that state courts shall have
concurrent jurisdiction of suits under the Act, withdrawn from each
state its recognized power to enjoin persons within its
jurisdiction from bringing a suit under the Act "contrary to equity
and good conscience" in the courts of another state? This question
was wholly outside the scope of the
Kepner case. It was
not presented, and was therefore not decided, by that case.
The relevant circumstances here are these. A resident of
Tennessee was killed in a railroad accident occurring in Tennessee.
The railroad, an Illinois corporation, has its principal offices in
Tennessee. All of the witnesses reside in Tennessee, as do the
deceased's legal representatives. But suit was brought in a state
court of Missouri, where the railroad does some business. Finding
that the Missouri suit was "oppressive and inequitable," the
Tennessee Court of Appeals sustained the power of the chancellor to
restrain the further prosecution of that suit. The finding that the
Missouri suit was "oppressive and inequitable" was challenged by
the petitioners neither before us nor in the courts of Tennessee,
and the propriety of the action taken by the Tennessee court, as a
matter of equitable discretion, is not here in issue. We are called
upon to decide only whether Congress has deprived Tennessee of the
power which it has asserted in this case.
It is admitted that the courts of Tennessee customarily exercise
this power in situations like the present case.
See American
Express Co. v. Fox, 135 Tenn. 489, 187 S.W. 1117. If the
accident here had occurred while the deceased was engaged in
intrastate commerce, and consequently had not given rise to a right
of action under the federal statute, Tennessee would unquestionably
have
Page 315 U. S. 712
had the power to do what she has done here. For, while the
Privileges and Immunities Clause, Art. IV, § 2, secures to citizens
of other states such right of access to the courts of state as that
state gives to its own citizens,
Chambers v. Baltimore &
Ohio R. Co., 207 U. S. 142,
207 U. S. 148;
McKnett v. St. Louis & S.F. Ry. Co., 292 U.
S. 230,
292 U. S. 233,
it does not take away from a state its historic power to prevent
unjust resort to the courts of another state.
Cole v.
Cunningham, 133 U. S. 107.
Moreover, the Constitution would not prevent Missouri from
declining to entertain a suit to vindicate a federal right, such as
was brought here, if an action to enforce a similar nonfederal
right would also not lie in her courts. The availability of state
courts for the enforcement of federal rights has not resulted in
putting federal rights on any different footing from state rights.
"A state may not discriminate against rights arising under federal
laws,"
McKnett v. St. Louis & S.F. Ry. Co., supra, at
292 U. S. 234, but
neither the Constitution nor Congress has compelled the states to
discriminate in favor of federal rights. And this Court has
expressly held that the rights created by the Federal Employers'
Liability Act are not different, in this respect, from other
federal rights.
"As to the grant of jurisdiction in the Employers' Liability
Act, that statute does not purport to require State Courts to
entertain suits arising under it, but only to empower them to do
so, so far as the authority of the United States is concerned."
Douglas v. New York, N.H. & H. R. Co., supra, at
279 U. S.
387.
The utilization of state courts for the vindication of federal
rights does not require that their established procedures be
remodeled, or that their customary modes for administering justice
be restricted.
"And it was, of course, presumably an appreciation of the
principles so thoroughly settled which caused Congress, in the
enactment of the Employers' Liability Act, to clearly contemplate
the
Page 315 U. S. 713
existence of a concurrent power and duty of both Federal and
state courts to administer the rights conferred by the statute in
accordance with the modes of procedure prevailing in such
courts."
Minneapolis & St. Louis R. v. Bombolis,
241 U. S. 211,
241 U. S. 218,
and see Second Employers' Liability Cases, 223 U. S.
1,
223 U. S. 56. The
mere fact that a federal right is the basis of suit cannot,
therefore, deprive the state courts of the power to use their
customary procedures for the achievement of justice. In simply
taking advantage of the facilities afforded by the courts of the
states, Congress cannot be deemed to have altered the settled
jurisprudence of the states so as to operate more favorably for
federal rights than for similar rights created by the states
themselves. Such drastic inroads upon the authority of the states
should be made only upon clear Congressional mandate.
The Court finds such a plain command in the Act because Congress
has explicitly provided in Section 6 that the jurisdiction of the
state courts "shall be concurrent" with that of the federal courts.
But Congress thereby merely spelt out what has always been
unquestioned constitutional doctrine.
"It is a general rule that the grant of jurisdiction to one
court does not, of itself, imply that the jurisdiction is to be
exclusive. . . . Upon the state courts, equally with the courts of
the Union, rests the obligation to guard and enforce every right
secured by the Constitution and laws of the United States whenever
those rights are involved in any suit or proceedings before
them."
United States v. Bank of New York Co., 296 U.
S. 463,
296 U. S. 479;
see Claflin v. Houseman, 93 U. S. 130,
93 U. S.
136-137;
Robb v. Connolly, 111 U.
S. 624,
111 U. S. 635,
111 U. S. 637.
And, in
Grubb v. Public Utilities Commission, 281 U.
S. 470,
281 U. S. 476,
the Court reaffirmed the doctrine that
"the state and federal courts have concurrent jurisdiction of
suits of a civil nature arising under the Constitution and laws of
the United
Page 315 U. S. 714
States, save in exceptional instances where the jurisdiction has
been restricted by Congress to the federal courts."
The source of these formulations is Hamilton's classic statement
in No. 82 of the Federalist (sesquicentennial ed., p. 536):
"I hold that the State courts will be divested of no part of
their primitive jurisdiction, further than may relate to an appeal,
and I am even of opinion that, in every case in which they were not
expressly excluded by the future acts of the national legislature,
they will, of course, take cognizance of the causes to which those
acts may give birth. This I infer from the nature of judiciary
power, and from the general genius of the system. The judiciary
power of every government looks beyond its own local or municipal
laws, and, in civil cases, lays hold of all subjects of litigation
between parties within its jurisdiction, though the causes of
dispute are relative to the laws of the most distant part of the
globe. . . . When, in addition to this, we consider the State
governments and the national governments, as they truly are, in the
light of kindred systems, and as parts of one whole, the inference
seems to be conclusive that the State courts would have a
concurrent jurisdiction in all cases arising under the laws of the
Union, where it was not expressly prohibited."
Therefore, if Congress had been silent with respect to the
jurisdiction of state courts of suits arising under the Act, the
state courts would still have had such jurisdiction. If it be
suggested that, by articulating what would otherwise have been
implied, Congress must have had some purpose, some interest of
emphasis, it would be enough to say that such punctiliousness, and
perhaps redundancy, of phrasing is not uncommon in procedural
legislation. But, in any event, the legislative history of the 1910
amendment conclusively shows that Congress did not insert this
Page 315 U. S. 715
provision in order to cut down the normal powers of state
courts. The concurrent jurisdiction of the state courts was
explicitly defined in order to dissipate an unwarranted doubt as to
the right and duty of state courts to entertain suits arising under
the Act. Congress wanted to avoid an implication of denial to the
state courts of power to entertain cases under the Act, and not to
create an implication of denial to the state courts of their
traditional powers in dealing with such cases.
The Act of 1908 contained no provision specifically dealing with
venue. 35 Stat. 65. On January 7, 1910, Representative Sterling
introduced a bill, H.R. 17263, that eventually became the 1910
amendment to the Act. The bill had this provision:
"This Act shall not be construed as excluding the exercise of a
concurrent jurisdiction of cases arising under the Act by the
courts of the several States."
The House Committee on the Judiciary reporting on the bill
explained its purpose:
"It is proposed to further amend the act by making the
jurisdiction of the courts of the United States 'concurrent with
the courts of the several States.'"
"This is proposed in order that there shall be no excuse for
courts of the States to follow in the error of
Hoxie v. N.Y.
N.H. & H.R. Co., [82 Conn. 352] (73 A. 754), in which the
court declined jurisdiction upon the ground,
inter alia,
that Congress did not intend that jurisdiction of cases arising
under the act should be assumed by state courts."
"It is clear under the decisions of the Supreme Court of the
United States, that this conclusion of the Connecticut court is
erroneous. And the reasons recited by the Connecticut court lead to
an opposite conclusion from that which the opinion declares upon
the subject. But no harm can come, and much injustice and wrong to
suitors may be prevented, by an express declaration that
Page 315 U. S. 716
there is no intent on the part of Congress to confine remedial
actions brought under the employers' liability act to the courts of
the United States."
H.Rep. No.513, 61st Cong., 2d Sess., p. 7.
The Committee also recommended that the wording of the provision
be changed to read as follows: "The jurisdiction of the courts of
the United States under this act shall be concurrent with that of
the courts of the several States." This language was embodied in
the Act.
When the bill came to the floor of the House, Representative
Sterling, who was in charge of the measure underscored the sole
reason for the provision:
"The second change in the law provides that the federal courts
and the state courts shall have concurrent jurisdiction. I am very
sure that they have concurrent jurisdiction as the law is now, but,
on account of a decision of one of the state courts of Connecticut,
where one judge declined to take jurisdiction in a case because it
was under a federal statute, the committee thought best to
expressly provide in the law that the federal courts and the state
courts should have concurrent jurisdiction to avoid the possibility
of such a construction in the future."
45 Cong.Rec. 2253.
In reply to a question as to the Committee's purpose in
recommending this provision, "Did you intend to limit the state
courts in any way in this matter?" the answer was, "Oh, no; just
the contrary." 45 Cong.Rec. 2254.
With these authoritative explanations. the bill was passed by
the House on February 23, 1910. 45 Cong.Rec. 2260. It was then sent
to the Senate, and there referred to its Judiciary Committee. The
report of that Committee repeated
in haec verba the
explanation of the provision made by the House Committee.
See Sen.Rep. No.432, 61st Cong., 2d Sess., p. 5. Senator
Borah, who steered the bill in the Senate, said:
Page 315 U. S. 717
"The amendment which has been proposed in the latter portion of
section 6 was necessitated, if that term can properly be used, by
reason of a decision of the Supreme court of the Connecticut. My
individual view is that the law is now as the amendment attempts to
make it -- that is to say, that both the federal and state courts
have jurisdiction of this matter -- concurrent jurisdiction. . . .
As I understand the law, unless there is a clause prohibiting or
inhibiting the state court, it always has concurrent jurisdiction
with the federal courts in such a subject matter as this. The
report cites a number of authorities to this effect. But the
supreme court of Connecticut refused to assume jurisdiction or to
take jurisdiction of the matter, though the well established legal
principle seems to be absolutely different. I do not believe this
amendment is necessary. I believe it is thoroughly established that
the federal courts and the state courts have concurrent
jurisdiction. But, in order to avoid courts' being misled upon this
proposition, this specific provision is thought to be necessary in
the law."
45 Cong.Rec. 3995.
See also his remarks at 45 Cong.Rec.
4034, 4035.
The Court appears to draw comfort from the provision of the Act
prohibiting removal of a suit from a state court of competent
jurisdiction to a federal court. The bill, as passed by the House,
contained no such provision. It was offered as an amendment on the
floor of the Senate by Senator Paynter, who, in proposing the
amendment, made a few remarks that are unenlightening for present
purposes. The amendment was approved by the Senate without further
discussion. 45 Cong.Rec. 4093. When the bill came back to the
House, Representative Clayton, a member of the House Judiciary
Committee, explained the purpose of this amendment:
"The real amendment [made by the Senate], and the one that I
think is a distinct improvement of the bill,
Page 315 U. S. 718
certainly more so than the other two, is to add . . . these
words:"
" And no case arising under this act and brought in any state
court of competent jurisdiction shall be removed to any court of
the United States."
"And the gentleman, being, as I am, a states-rights Democrat,
will certainly say that is a decided improvement upon the bill as
it originally passed the House. Furthermore, I say that this
amendment will tend to relieve the federal courts of some
litigation which can be as well, if not better, determined in the
courts of the States."
45 Cong.Rec. 4158.
Such a restriction against removal of litigation normally
arising in the state courts is not unique in the history of
legislation dealing with the business of the lower federal courts.
Thirty years earlier, Congress had begun to limit the right of
removal to the federal courts.
See, e.g., Act of July 12,
1882, § 4, 22 Stat. 162, 163; Act of March 3, 1887, 24 Stat. 552,
corrected by Act of August 13, 1888, 25 Stat. 433. The removal
prohibition of the 1910 Act must be regarded as a phase of the
movement to ease the pressure upon the lower federal courts by
curtailing access to them, rather than by multiplying unduly the
number of federal judges. Nothing warrants the inference that
thereby Congress intended a reversal of the historic relation of
state courts to one another.
That no expression of Congress, nor the purposes revealed by it
outside of the language it employed, calls for a break with the
past in giving effect to the 1910 amendment was the conclusion
reached by this Court upon the fullest consideration of the
significance of the provision. "The amendment, as appears by its
language," it was held in the
Second Employers' Liability
Cases, 223 U. S. 1,
223 U. S. 56,
"instead of granting jurisdiction to the state courts, presupposes
that they already possessed it." Later, in the
Douglas
case, the Court noted that the amendment
"does not purport to require State Courts to entertain suits
arising under it, but only to empower them to do so so far
Page 315 U. S. 719
as the authority of the United States is concerned."
279 U.S. at
279 U. S. 387.
And again, in
McKnett's case, 292 U.S. at
292 U. S. 233,
the Court emphasized that "Congress has not attempted to compel
states to provide courts for the enforcement of the Federal
Employers' Liability Act." In short, every time the question has
arisen, this Court has recognized that, by the 1910 amendment,
Congress did not write a new chapter in judicial history, nor did
it modify the historic function of state courts as agencies for the
enforcement of federal rights employing the same instruments for
achieving justice as they employ when enforcing rights having their
source in state law.
The Court now holds that, where considerations of equity and
justice are otherwise compelling, Section 6 has deprived the state
courts of the power to enjoin a plaintiff from pursuing a suit
against a carrier in the courts of any state in which the carrier
does business. But a series of decisions following
Davis v.
Farmers' Cooperative Co., 262 U. S. 312,
enforces a contrary proposition. In these cases, notably
Denver
& R.G.W. R. Co. v. Terte, 284 U.
S. 284, and
Michigan Central R. Co. v. Mix,
278 U. S. 492,
suits against a carrier in a state where it did business were
nevertheless found to constitute an unjustifiable burden on
commerce, and therefore could not be maintained. If Congress had
conferred obligatory jurisdiction upon the state courts, it would
have been entirely beyond the province of this Court to hold, as it
did in these decisions, that a suit in a state court which was
given "concurrent jurisdiction" by the 1910 amendment constituted a
burden on commerce. To suggest that the grant of "concurrent
jurisdiction" repealed the historic powers of equity sanctioned by
Cole v. Cunningham, 133 U. S. 107, is
to imply that, in all these cases, the Court disregarded what is
now found to be the right of a plaintiff to resort to a state
court, unhampered by the authority of the state courts to invoke
their familiar equitable powers to restrain oppressive and
Page 315 U. S. 720
vexatious suits in other state courts. This is to say that, in
all these cases over a period of years, this Court disregarded the
jurisdictional requirements of the Federal Employers' Liability
Act. Yet the Act was constantly before the Court, and, it may not
be amiss to recall, no member of this Court, in modern times, at
least, was more familiar with and more mindful of jurisdictional
requirements than Mr. Justice Brandeis, who spoke for a unanimous
Court in both the
Davis and
Mix cases.
The Court does not now overrule these decisions. They stand as
unchallenged authorities that, in giving the state courts
concurrent jurisdiction of suits under the Act, Congress did not
thereby preclude the application of principles of equity and
justice to such suits. These decisions show clearly that Section 6
did not give the state courts compulsive jurisdiction; it merely
conferred authority to be administered in the context of existing
law.
The power invoked by Tennessee in this case was a familiar head
of equity jurisdiction long before the Constitution. Injunctions by
the chancellor against suits in other courts go back to at least
the late sixteenth century.
See Cliffe v. Turnor, Cary 83
(1579);
Chock v. Chea, Cary 83 (1579);
Tanfield v.
Davenport, Tot. 114 (1638);
Trinick v. Bordfield,
Tot. 117 (1638). When Lord Chancellor Clarendon, in 1677, refused
to enjoin a foreign attachment,
Love v. Baker, Ch.Cas. 67,
the reporter noted that
"all the bar was of another opinion. It was said the injunction
did not lie for foreign jurisdictions, nor out of the king's
dominions. But to that it was answered, the injunction was not to
the court, but to the party."
The opinion of the bar soon became the accepted law of England.
In the leading case of
Lord Portarlington v. Soulby, 3
Myl.& K. 104, Brougham, L.C., expressed the historic doctrine
of equity jurisdiction. Referring to the attitude of the bar
towards
Love v. Baker, he commented:
"A very sound answer, as it appears to me, for the same argument
might
Page 315 U. S. 721
apply to a Court within this country, which no order of this
Court ever affects to bind, our orders being only pointed at the
parties to restrain them from proceeding. Accordingly, this case of
Love v. Baker has not been recognized or followed in later
times."
3 Myl. & K. at 107.
See Wharton v. May, 5 Ves.Jr.
27;
Kennedy v. Earl of Casillis, 2 Swans. 313;
Harrison v. Gurney, 2 Jac. & W. 563;
Bushby v.
Munday, 5 Madd. 184;
Beauchamp v. Marquis of Huntley,
Jac. 546; Eden on Injunctions (1822 Ed.) pp. 3
et seq.,
101-102.
This doctrine of equitable power has been universally accepted
by American courts.
See, e.g., Dehon v. Foster, 4 Allen,
Mass. 545, 550;
Cole v. Young, 24 Kan. 435, 438;
Bigelow v. Old Dominion Co., 74 N.J.Eq. 457, 473, 71 A.
153. And the power has been exercised by the state courts generally
to enjoin oppressive suits brought under the Act in other state
courts.
See Reed's Adm'x v. Illinois Central R. Co., 182
Ky. 455, 206 S.W. 794;
Chicago, M. & St.P. R. Co. v.
McGinley, 175 Wis. 565, 185 N.W. 218;
State ex rel. New
York, C. & St.L. R. Co. v. Nortoni, 331 Mo. 764, 55 S.W.2d
272;
Kern v. Cleveland, C., C. & St.L. R. Co., 204
Ind. 595, 185 N.E. 446. Of course, since a federal right is
involved, no state court can screen denial of or discrimination
against a federal right under the guise of enforcing its local law.
Davis v. Wechsler, 263 U. S. 22;
Southern Ry. Co. v. Painter, 314 U.
S. 155,
314 U. S.
159-160.
The power of equity to restrain the prosecution of
unconscionable suits has been part of the very fabric of the state
courts as we have known them in our whole history. And nothing in
the Federal Employers' Liability Act, its language, its history, or
its policy warrants a denial of this power to the states.
THE CHIEF JUSTICE, MR. JUSTICE ROBERTS, and MR. JUSTICE BYRNES,
join in this dissent.