Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 5.djvu/939

 THE GABLAND. 927 �althougb the death shall bave been caused under suob cir- cumstances as amount in law to felony." The second section provides that the action sball be brought by the personal representatives ôf the deceased person for th« exclusive ben- efit of bis widow and next of kin. The tort in this case occurred upon navigable waters, and, had the deceased sur- vived, there is no question that he could bave maintained the libel, irrespective of any state statute. In the Stearriboat Co. V. Chase, 16 Wall. 532, Mr, Justice Clifford expressed a doubt vrbether a state statute could be regarded as applicable in such a case to authorize the legal representatives of the deceased to maintain such an action for the benefit of the nextof kin, giving as a reason that state laws cannot extend or restrict the jurisdiction of admiralty courts. We had sup- posed from the reading of other cases that where a state statute gave a right of action, a federal court vrould adinin- ister the remedy where the requisite jurisdictional averments could be made ; and j if the action was maritime in its nature, a court of admiralty would bô a proper tribunal. Thus, in Ex pwrte McNeil, 13 Wall. 243, a libel was sustained under a state statute aUowing pilotage fees to the pilot who first tenders bis services. In delivering the opinion, Mr. Justice Swayne observes : "The state law cannot give jurisdiction to any federal court. But that is.not the question in this case. A state law may give a substantial right of such a character that, where there is no impedimçnt arising from the residence of the parties, the right may be enforced in the proper fed- eral tribunal, whether it be a court of equity, of admiralty, or of common law. The statute in such cases does not confer the jurisdiction; that exists already, and it is invoked to give effect to the right by applying the appropriate remedy. This principle may be laid down as axiomatic in our national jurisprudence." Other cases in the same court announce a similar doctrine. But this question is also so thoroughly reviewed in the case of Holmes v. The 0. d G. By. Co., to which attention bas already been called, that any further consideration of the subject will resuit in a useless repetition of Judge Deady's reasoning, in which I fully concur. ����