Court Opinion

ID: 9422996
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 23:05:26.332996+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:22:40.825836
License: Public Domain

Mr. Justice Douglas,
whom Mr. Justice Black joins,
concurring.
The federal question presented is whether this action, timely started in the state court but not timely started if the filing date in the federal court governs, was “commenced within three years from the day the cause of action accrued” within the meaning of 45 U. S. C. § 56. I think it was so “commenced,” as much as was the action in Herb v. Pitcairn, 325 U. S. 77.
In reaching this conclusion I do not find it necessary to rely on the fact that petitioner.filed in the federal court “before his time for appealing from the Ohio order had expired,” ante, this page. Instead I rest simply on the ground that “when process has been adequate to bring in the parties and to start the case on a course of judicial handling which may lead to final judgment without issuance of new initial process, it is enough to commence the action within the federal statute.” 325 U. S.,.at 79. *437(Emphasis supplied.) And see Herb v. Pitcairn, 324 U. S. 117, 132-133 (dissenting opinion of Black, J.), setting forth the requirements for commencing an FELA action within the meaning of 45 U. S. C. § 56: (1) a bona fide effort to prosecute the claim, (2) in a court having jurisdiction, (3) resulting in-notice to the defendant.
If after dismissal the plaintiff delays inexcusably in refiling his suit in the proper court and the defendant is prejudiced by the delay, the action will of course be barred by laches. Gardner v. Panama R. Co., 342 U. S. 29, 30-31. That familiar equitable doctrine provides the defendant with adequate protection against delay. The Court rejects this established doctrine, however, creating a new statute of limitations of its own which makes the timeliness of a federal cause of action depend on state time requirements which were adopted for other, unrelated purposes and which vary from State to State. The long-established federal rule of laches, in contrast, is uncomplicated, uniform, and directly responsive to the problem. Laches, of course, has no application in the instant case, as petitioner filed in the federal court only eight days after his state court action had been dismissed.