Louisville & Nashville Railroad Co. v. Mottley
| Louisville & Nashville Railroad Co. v. Mottley | |
|---|---|
| Argued October 13, 1908 Decided November 16, 1908 | |
| Full case name | Louisville & Nashville Railroad Company v. E. L. Mottley and Annie E. Mottley |
| Citations | 211 U.S. 149 (more) 29 S. Ct. 42; 53 L. Ed. 126; 1908 U.S. LEXIS 1533 |
| Case history | |
| Prior | Mottley v. Louisville & Nashville R.R., 150 F. 406 (C.C.W.D. Ky. 1907) |
| Subsequent | 133 Ky. 652, 118 S.W. 982 (1909); reversed, 219 U.S. 467 (1911) |
| Holding | |
| A suit arises under the Constitution and laws of the United States only when the plaintiff's statement of his own cause of action shows that it is based upon those laws or that Constitution. | |
| Court membership | |
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| Case opinion | |
| Majority | Moody, joined by unanimous |
| Laws applied | |
| 25 Stat. 434, c. 866 (then-current federal question jurisdiction statute; current analogue 28 U.S.C. § 1331) | |
Louisville & Nashville Railroad Company v. Mottley, 211 U.S. 149 (1908), was a United States Supreme Court decision that held that under the existing statutory scheme, federal question jurisdiction could not be predicated on a plaintiff's anticipation that the defendant would raise a federal statute as a defense. Instead, such jurisdiction can only arise from a complaint by the plaintiff that the defendant has directly violated some provision of the Constitution, laws, or treaties of the United States. This reading of the federal question jurisdiction statute is now known as the well-pleaded complaint rule.