Southern Ry Co v. Painter, 24
| Decision Date | 17 November 1941 |
| Docket Number | No. 24,24 |
| Citation | 62 S.Ct. 154,86 L.Ed. 116,314 U.S. 155 |
| Parties | SOUTHERN RY. CO. v. PAINTER |
| Court | U.S. Supreme Court |
Mr. Sidney S. Alderman, of Washington, D.C., for petitioner.
Mr. Roberts P. Elam, of St. Louis, Mo., for respondent.
[Argument of Counsel from pages 155-157 intentionally omitted] Mr. Justice FRANKFURTER delivered the opinion of the Court.
On August 31, 1939, respondent brought an action against petitioner in the federal District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri to recover damages under the Federal Employers' Liability Act, 35 Stat. 65, 45 U.S.C. § 51 et seq., 45 U.S.C.A. § 51 et seq., for the wrongful death of her husband while employed by petitioner as a fireman on an interstate train operated between points in Tennessee and North Carolina. While this action was pending, petitioner filed a bill in the Chancery Court of Knox County, Tennessee, alleging that respondent and the deceased were citizens of Tennessee; that petitioner, a Virginia corporation having its principal office in Richmond, Virginia, does no business in Missouri other than of an interstate character; that the accident occurred in Madison County, North Carolina, 'just beyond the North Carolina-Tennessee line'; that the Missouri federal court is more than 500 miles distant from respondent's residence, the residence of petitioner's witnesses, and the place where the accident occurred; that petitioner could not transport its witnesses to Missouri except at 'enormous expense'; that respondent's purpose in bringing suit in Missouri was to evade the law of Tennessee and North Carolina; and that petitioner maintains agents in Tennessee and North Carolina upon whom process can be served. The chancellor thereupon enjoined respondent from further prosecuting her action in the Missouri federal court and from instituting any similar suits against petitioner except in the state and federal courts in Tennessee and North Carolina. Respondent did not appeal from this decree. Instead, she filed a 'supplemental bill' in the Missouri federal court to enjoin the proceedings in the Tennessee state court. Holding that the commencement of respondent's action for damages gave the federal court 'specific, complete, sole and exclusive jurisdiction' which could not be 'intrenched upon' by proceedings in another court, the District Court, by an appropriate interlocutory decree, forbade petitioner from further prosecuting its suit in the Tennessee state court and ordered it to dismiss the state suit. This decree was affirmed by the Circuit Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit, 117 F.2d 100. We brought the case here, 313 U.S. 556, 61 S.Ct. 1093, 85 L.Ed. 1518, in view of the relation of its jurisdictional problems to those in Toucey v. New York Life Insurance Company (Phoenix...
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