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The Constitution of the United States of America: Analysis and Interpretation

Edward S. Corwin · 1953

passage 525 of 1082 · act to regulate and minimize, are local controversies and > Section 34 of the Judiciary Act of 1789 provided that in diversity cases at common law the laws of the several States should be the rules of decision in the United States courts. However, in Swift *v.* Tyson[536] (20/20)

to construe allegations in a complaint asserting a right under the liability act in order to determine whether a State court has denied a right of trial guaranteed by Congress.[717]

STATE OBLIGATION TO ENFORCE FEDERAL LAW

The issue of State obligation to administer federal law was presented most recently by Testa v. Katt.[718] This case arose out of the Emergency Price Control Act of 1942,[719] which provided that persons who had been overcharged in violation of the act or, in the alternative, the Price Administrator, could sue for treble damages in any court of competent jurisdiction. On the ground that one sovereign cannot enforce the penal laws of another, the Rhode Island Supreme Court ruled that the State courts had no jurisdiction of such suits. Assuming for the purposes of the case that the treble damage provision, was "penal" in nature, Justice Black for a unanimous Court proceeded to lay to rest the principle that a State court is not bound to enforce federal criminal law as an assumption flying "in the face of the fact that the States of the Union constitute a nation" and one which disregarded the supremacy clause. Justice Black also pointed to early acts of Congress and early decisions of the Supreme Court as establishing the rule that "State courts do not bear the same relation to the United States as they do to foreign countries."[720] The Prigg case, though not overruled expressly, was ignored save for its citation in a footnote.[721]

RIGHT OF FOREIGN CORPORATIONS TO RESORT TO FEDERAL COURTS

In a series of cases the Court has been called upon to adjudicate between the power of a State to exclude foreign corporations from doing a purely domestic business within its borders and the right of such foreign corporations to resort to the federal courts. After deciding first one way and then the other, on the basis of some highly refined distinctions,[722] it finally, in 1922, came out unqualifiedly for the latter right. This was in Terral v. Burke Construction Co.,[723] in which an Arkansas statute requiring the cancellation of the license of a foreign corporation to do business in the State, upon notice that such corporation had removed a case to a federal court, was pronounced void. At the same time all contrary decisions were explicitly overruled.

Clause 3. The Trial of all Crimes, except in Cases of Impeachment, shall be by Jury; and such Trial shall be held in the State where the said Crimes shall have been committed; but when not committed within any State, the Trial shall be at such Place or Places as the Congress may by Law have directed. See Amendment VI, pp. 878-881.

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The Constitution of the United States of America: Analysis and Interpretation · Edward S. Corwin · 1953