Swift v. Tyson

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Swift v. Tyson

Supreme Court of the United States

Decided January 25, 1842


Full case name:	John Swift v. George W. Tyson

Citations:	41 U.S. 1; 10 L. Ed. 865; 1842 U.S. LEXIS 345

Prior history:	On a certificate of division from the Circuit Court of the United States for the Southern District of New York

Holding

Federal courts were to create and apply a federal common law in diversity cases.

Court membership

Chief Justice: Roger B. Taney
Associate Justices: Joseph Story, Smith Thompson, John McLean, Henry Baldwin, James Moore Wayne, John Catron, John McKinley, Peter Vivian Daniel

Case opinions

Majority by: Story
Joined by: unanimous
Concurrence/dissent by: Catron

Overruled by

Erie Railroad Co. v. Tompkins, 304 U.S. 64 (1938)

Swift v. Tyson, 41 U.S. 1 (1842)^[1], was a case in which the United States Supreme Court determined that United States federal courts hearing cases brought under their diversity jurisdiction must apply the statutory law of the states, but instead of applying the court-made common law of the states, they should develop a federal common law.

This case has been unfairly criticised for forum shopping because the facts of the case involved the quintessence of the need for a uniform nation wide rule, the handling of negotiable instruments -- and the fact that most of the land has subscribed to the Uniform Commercial Code's Article 5 shows us that it did. The problem was that the "rule in Swift" was extended by later judges to cover all of common law and not that of commercial paper, bank notes, bankers acceptances and other near money.

This decision resulted in forum shopping, wherein plaintiffs would file their cases in federal as opposed to state courts in order to have a different law applied. This was seen to result in manipulation of the federal court system and was eventually overturned in Erie Railroad v. Tompkins, 304 U.S. 64 (1938).