Note 99 — ARTICLE IV
Reading edition
Dennick v. R.R., 103 U.S. 11 (1881) was the first of the so-called "Death Act" cases to reach the Supreme Court. See also Stewart v. B.& O.R. Co., 168 U.S. 445 (1897). Even today the obligation of a State to furnish a forum for the determination of death claims arising in another State under the laws thereof appears to rest on a rather precarious basis. In Hughes v. Fetter, 341 U.S. 609 (1951), the Court, by a narrow majority, held invalid under the full faith and credit clause a statute of Wisconsin which, as locally interpreted, forbade its courts to entertain suits of this nature; and in First National Bank v. United Air Lines, 342 U.S. 396 (1952), a like result was reached as to an Illinois statute. In both cases the same four Justices dissented.