FEDERAL COURTS - REVIEW OF STATE COURTS DECISION INVOLVING FEDERAL AND NONFEDERAL OUESTIONS

Authors

John C. Johnston, University of Michigan Law SchoolFollow

Abstract

In exercising appellate jurisdiction over federal questions raised in the highest court of a state, the Supreme Court of the United States has refused to adopt the view that the existence of a federal question in the record or decision of the state court will empower it to decide every other question that is raised in the case. Correlated to this refusal to review the nonfederal question is the further self-imposed limitation that where the decision of the state court rests upon a nonfederal ground sufficient in itself to support the judgment of the state court, the Supreme Court will not review that judgment, even though the state court decided a federal question erroneously. It is the purpose of this comment to examine the present status of these rules and some of the problems arising thereunder.

Recommended Citation

John C. Johnston, FEDERAL COURTS - REVIEW OF STATE COURTS DECISION INVOLVING FEDERAL AND NONFEDERAL OUESTIONS, 40 Mich. L. Rev. 84 (1941).
Available at: https://repository.law.umich.edu/mlr/vol40/iss1/6