Court Opinion

ID: 9443811
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-03 19:31:15.554272+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:29:36.628890
License: Public Domain

MARIS, Circuit Judge
(concurring).
I join fully in everything which is said in the opinion of the court. I desire to add a few words, however, since I think that the action of the district court may be sustained on the additional ground that the court never acquired jurisdiction of the persons of the defendants. Merely carrying out in this case the ritual of serving process upon the state’s own officer, the Secretary of the Commonwealth,11 was not sufficient validly to summon the nonresident defendants into court. This was settled in Wuchter v. Pizzutti, 1928, 276 U.S. 13, 48 S.Ct. 259, 72 L.Ed. 446. In that case the Supreme Court held that in order to afford a nonresident motorist procedural due process of law it is necessary to provide for giving reasonable notice of suit to the nonresident himself. Pennsylvania Civil Procedure Rule 2079(a) 12 provides for such notice to be given by registered mail. It thus appears that it was by such extraterritorial service, if at all, that the district court acquired jurisdiction of the persons of the nonresident defendants.13 But this service, being extraterritorial, could not be effective to do so in the present case. For extraterritorial service in the federal courts is regulated by Federal Civil Procedure rule 4(f), 28 U.S.C.14 That rule restricts the service of process to the territorial limits of the state in which the district court is held unless a statute of the United States authorizes service beyond those limits. In this respect the rule is a limitation upon the provisions of Federal Civil Procedure rule 4 (d) (7) which authorize service in the manner prescribed by stale law. Since there is no federal statute authorizing extraterritorial service in a diversity case such as this one, rule 4(f) operated to prohibit service upon the defendants in North Carolina by registered mail in the manner provided by Pennsylvania Civil Procedure rule 2079(a). The district court, therefore, did not, in my opinion, acquire jurisdiction of the person of the defendants.
It may be thought that the conclusion which the court has reached in the present case is inconsistent with the doctrine of Erie R. Co. v. Tompkins, 1938, 304 U.S. *50264, 58 S.Ct. 817, 82 L.Ed. 1188. It is true that there is here diversity of citizenship and jurisdictional amount and that the case might have been brought in the Pennsylvania state courts. It is also true that the sweep of Erie R. Co. v. Tompkins takes in not only the field of what has been conventionally regarded as substantive law, but also calls for the application in federal diversity cases of many state laws which for other purposes are regarded as procedural.15 But the application of the Rules 'of Decision Act under the doctrine of Erie R. Co. v. Tompkins necessarily stops at the point where in the procedural field an Act of Congress or a rule of procedure promulgated by the Supreme Court pursuant to Congressional authority prescribes a uniform rule for the federal courts to follow. That is the situation here. True, the plaintiff could have brought suit in the state court and the defendant could have removed the suit to the federal district court. For Section 1441(a) of Title 28r U.S.C., would give the district court venue jurisdiction,16 and Pennsylvania Civil Procedure Rule 2079(a) rather than Federal Civil Procedure Rule 4 would be applicable to the service of process.17 But here Section 1391 of Title 28, U.S.C., and Federal Civil. Procedure Rule 4(f) prescribe the procedure in these matters and there is,, therefore, no area for the application of state law under the Rules of Decision Act-

. The Pennsylvania non-resident motorist statute, 75 P.S.Pa. § 1201, provides that tlie Secretary of Iievenue shall be the motorist’s “agent for the service of process”. Service here, however, was had upon another officer, the Secretary of the Commonwealth, under Pennsylvania Civil Procedure Eule 2070(a). Tims the officer served was not even a statutory “agent” and the service upon him was pure legal Mumbo Jumbo.

. “Eule 2079. Service of process.
“(a) If an action of the class specified in Eule 2077(a) (1) is commenced in the county in which the cause of action arose, process may be served upon the defendant personally or by having the sheriff of said county send by registered mail, return receipt requested, a true and attested copy of the process;
“(1) to the Secretary of the Commonwealth, accompanied by the fee prescribed by law, and
“(2) to the defendant at Ms last known address with aa endorsement thereon showing that service was made upon the Secretary of the Commonwealth.”

. Extraterritorial service upon a nonresident who is otherwise subject to the jurisdiction of a state has been recognized as conferring jurisdiction over his person in conformity with due process of law. Milliken v. Meyer, 1940, 331. U.S. 457, 61 S.Ct. 339, 85 L.Ed. 278; Travellers Health Ass’n v. Com. of Virginia, 1950, 339 U.S. 643, 70 S.Ct. 927, 94 L.Ed. 1154.

. “Eulo 4. Process.
❖ * * # * * *
“(f) Territorial Limits of Effective Service. All process other than a subpoena may be served anywhere within the territorial limits of the state in which the district court is held and, when a statute of the United States so provides, beyond the territorial limits of that state. A subpoena may be served within the territorial limits provided in Eule 45.”

. Sampson v. Channell, 1 Cir., 1940, 110 F.2d 754, 128 A.L.R. 394, certiorari denied 310 U.S. 650, 60 S.Ct. 1099, 84 L.Ed. 1415; Palmer v. Hoffman, 1943, 318 U.S. 109, 63 S.Ct. 477, 87 L.Ed. 645, 144 A. L.R. 719; Guaranty Trust Co. v. York, 1945, 326 U.S. 99, 65 S.Ct. 1464, 89 L.Ed. 2079, 160 A.L.R. 1231; Angel v. Buffington, 1947, 330 U.S. 183, 67 S.Ct. 657, 91 L.Ed. 832; Cohen v. Beneficial Loan Corp., 1949, 337 U.S. 541, 69 S.Ct. 1221, 93 L.Ed. 1528; Macias v. Klein, 3 Cir., 1953, 203 F.2d 205.

. Lee v. Chesapeake & Ohio Ry., 1923, 260 U.S. 653, 43 S.Ct. 230, 67 L.Ed. 443.

. Hudson Nav. Co. v. Murray, D.C.N.J. 1916, 236 F. 419; Oldmixon v. Pennsylvania R. Co., D.C.N.Y., 1932, 1 F.Supp. 101.