Sibbach v. Wilson

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Sibbach v. Wilson

Argued December 17, 1940
Decided January 13, 1941

Full case name:	Sibbach v. Wilson & Company, Incorporated

Citations:	312 U.S. 1; 61 S. Ct. 422; 85 L. Ed. 479; 1941 U.S. LEXIS 1032

Prior history:	Cert. to the Circuit Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit

Holding

In a diverse jurisdiction case, important and substantial procedures are considered "Procedural" not "Substantive" and the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure apply.

Court membership

Chief Justice: Charles Evans Hughes
Associate Justices: James Clark McReynolds, Harlan Fiske Stone, Owen Josephus Roberts, Hugo Black, Stanley Forman Reed, Felix Frankfurter, William O. Douglas, Frank Murphy

Case opinions

Majority by: Roberts
Joined by: Hughes, McReynolds, Stone, Reed
Dissent by: Frankfurter
Joined by: Black, Douglas, Murphy

Sibbach v. Wilson, 312 U.S. 1 (1941), was a decision by the United States Supreme Court in which the court held that important and substantial procedures are not substantive, rather they are still considered procedural, and federal law applies.

This was a post-Erie (Erie Railroad v. Tompkins, 304 U.S. 64 (1938)) decision, and thus the decision whether to apply the law of the state of jurisdiction or uniform federal rules depended on whether the rule in question was procedural or substantive in nature.