Fore River Shipbuilding Company v. Selma Hagg

• Decision Date: 03 January 1911
• Docket Number: No. 75,75
• Citation: 31 S.Ct. 185,219 U.S. 175,55 L.Ed. 163
• Parties: FORE RIVER SHIPBUILDING COMPANY, Plff. in Err. v. SELMA T. HAGG
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

219 U.S. 175

31 S.Ct. 185

55 L.Ed. 163

FORE RIVER SHIPBUILDING COMPANY, Plff. in Err.

v SELMA T. HAGG.

No. 75.

Submitted December 16, 1910.

Decided January 3, 1911.

Messrs. John Lowell and James A. Lowell for plaintiff in error.

Messrs. Asa P. French and James S. Allen, Jr., for defendant in error.

Mr. Justice Day delivered the opinion of the court:

This case is here upon a question involving the jurisdiction of the circuit court of the United States for the destrict of Massachusetts to entertain the action. It was begun in the circuit court by Selma T. Hagg, a citizen of Sweden, against the Fore River Shipbuilding Company, a corporation of the commonwealth of Massachusetts. The object of the suit was to recover damages under the employers' liability act of Massachusetts (Revised Laws, chap. 106, § 73), and was for the death, without conscious suffering, of her husband, Charles A. Hagg, an employee of the defendant company, resulting from an injury received in the defendant's forge shop in Quincy, Massachusetts. The action resulted in a verdict and judgment for the plaintiff below. The defendant below moved the court to dismiss the action on the ground that it was without jurisdiction, for the reason that the Massachusetts statute was of a penal character, and therefore an action upon it could be maintained only in the courts of Massachusetts. The case comes here upon certificate of the judge of the circuit court, and the question stated is 'whether or not the statute under which the plaintiff's action was brought was of such a penal character that the circuit court did not have jurisdiction of said action.'

In behalf of the defendant company, now plaintiff in error, it is contended that a penal action of this character can be brought only in the courts of Massachusetts, and it is insisted that such is the rule applicable to cases of this character as between separate and distinct sovereignties. It is argued that the act under which the suit was brought is a penal statute, and it is insisted that the wrong done as primarily an offense against the public, and the relief sought not of the class of actions remedial in their nature, wherein recovery is given in the form of compensation to the widow or children of the deceased, which actions have been sustained in the courts of states other than those enacting the statute.

The question presented, therefore, is whether, owing to the character of the Massachusetts act, the courts of another sovereignty will enforce its provisions, or whether the sole remedy is under the laws of the commonwealth enacting the statute.

This court takes notice of its own jurisdiction, and whether the question is raised by the counsel or not, inquires of its own motion whether there is jurisdiction to entertain any given case before it. Mansfield, C. & L. M. R. Co. v. Swan, 111 U. S. 379-382, 28 L. ed. 462, 463, 4 Sup. Ct. Rep. 510, 511.

In that case Mr. Justice Matthews, who spoke for the court, said:

'On every writ of error or appeal, the first and fundamental question is that of jurisdiction; first, of this court, and then of the court from which the record comes. This question the court is bound to ask and answer for itself, even when not otherwise suggested, and without respect to the relation of the parties to it.'

We shall then inquire, Has this court jurisdiction to entertain this attempt at a direct review of the circuit court's judgment certified here upon the question of jurisdiction? By the court of appeals act of March 3, 1891 (26 Stat. at L. 826, chap. 517, U. S. Comp. Stat. 1901, p. 549), a writ of error may be taken directly from a circuit court to this court in certain cases, among which is 'any case in which the jurisdiction of the court is in issue;' and it is further provided: 'In such cases the question of jurisdiction alone shall be certified to the Supreme Court from the...