Source: https://www.legalcrystal.com/case/89398/pennsylvania-r-co-vs-hughes
Timestamp: 2019-04-25 14:23:38+00:00

Document:
Neither of these assignments of error presents a federal question in such sense as to give this Court jurisdiction to review the judgment of the state court under § 709 of the Revised Statutes of the United States. Nothing is better settled in federal jurisprudence than that the jurisdiction of this Court in such cases depends upon the assertion of a right, title, privilege, or immunity under the federal Constitution or laws set up and denied in the state courts. Beals v. Cone, 188 U. S. 184 .
in case of loss by the negligence of the carrier, will be upheld as a proper and lawful mode of securing a due proportion between the amount for which the carrier is responsible and the freight received, and of protecting the carrier against extravagant valuations. But this is not a question of federal law wherein the decision of the highest federal tribunal is of conclusive authority. In Grogan v. Adams Express Co., 114 Pa. 523, the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania expressly declined to follow the rule laid down in Hart v. Railroad, adhering to its own declared doctrine denying the right of a common carrier to thus limit its liability for injuries resulting from negligence. The cases are numerous and conflicting, different rules prevailing in different states. The federal courts, in cases of which they have jurisdiction, will doubtless continue to follow the rule of the Hart case, but the highest court of Pennsylvania may administer the common law according to its understanding and interpretation of it, being only amenable to review in the federal Supreme Court where some right, title, immunity, or privilege, the creation of the federal power, has been asserted and denied. Bethell v. Demaret, 10 Wall. 537; Delmas v. Ins. Co., 14 Wall. 666; Ins. Co. v. Hendren, 92 U. S. 287 ; United States v. Thompson, 93 U. S. 586 .
In the absence of Congressional legislation upon the subject, an act of the legislature of Alabama, to require locomotive engineers to be examined and licensed by a board to be appointed by the governor for that purpose, was sustained in Smith v. Alabama, 124 U. S. 465 .
An enumeration of the instances in which this Court has sustained the validity of local laws intended to promote the safety and comfort of passengers, employees, persons crossing railroad tracks, and adjacent property owners is given in the opinion by MR. JUSTICE BROWN in Cleveland &c.; Ry. Co. v. Illinois, 177 U. S. 514 , 177 U. S. 516 .

References: § 709
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