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I was born ready.

Welcome to Advisory Opinions. I'm Sarah Isgrid that's David French and boy are we in for a treat today. I've been waiting for this.

I'm so excited because we left one Supreme Court case just totally on the table because we knew we couldn't do it without an actual professor to help us walk through the Mallory case and we got the best one Amanda Tyler is the Shannon Turner professor of law at Berkeley.

She is also the author of two different books that we're definitely going to get to as well. Justice Justice thou shalt pursue a life's work fighting for a more perfect union that she wrote with Ruth Bader Ginsburg the justice that she clerked for and habeas corpus and wartime from the Tower of London to Guantanamo Bay.

This is going to get lit but before we do either of those again Mallory versus Norfolk Southern railroad company.

Arguably was the biggest case of the term again depending on how you define biggest and you and I've gone over that a thousand times David.

But like it's really big we didn't talk about it once we were saving it we pocketed it.

Thank you professor Tyler for being here to teach us all some Fed courts we're going to do some international shoe some Pennsylvania fire I sort of requested an eerie primer at one point I mean this is it's going to get real thanks for being here it's great to be here it's going to give me flashbacks Sarah to professor I had Fed courts exam my three L's.

My three L year of law school where I literally lost my outline the night before the exam and it was one of these open book exams or you could bring in your outline and I lost it on my computer and so scrolled and an outline by hand quickly before my exam it was not my favorite not my favorite day but I was one of my favorite courses not my favorite day but one of my favorite courses.

Well she's going to have to explain what Fed courts mean we're starting way at the end of the line here I know I know I'm sorry I'm sorry the class is called federal courts and I for one was like that sounds pretty easy isn't that what we've been doing this whole time in law school no is the answer no.

Well federal courts is whatever the professor says it is it if I'm being honest one of my great professors to fall in vote of paper on this and he said you know it really is a combination of a bunch of topics that aren't necessarily otherwise connected that being said I think they are and so far as generally speaking the topics that we see in the course including standing.

The division of interpretive authority between the state and federal courts the role the supervisory role of the Supreme Court over both lower courts lower federal courts and state courts etc I can go on they're all connected to this basic question which is.

What is the role of the federal courts in the system and how do they interconnect with the other branches and the state courts and as you can imagine if you define it that broadly there are to come back to my first point why do you topics that fall under that umbrella and for me that's one of the things that makes it really fun to teach the course because you can really put your own stamp on it and spend time on a whole range of different subjects and particularly the subjects that you think are the most interesting and.

Most fun and most likely to engage the students well perhaps it's meaningful then that I also had Professor Fallon for Fed courts and so did I that he was.

I love it.

Three generations of Fallon Fed courts graduates here well I actually had Dan Meltzer for federal courts but I had Fallon for first amendment and then I got to work with him as an editor of Heart and Waxler so I have infused the Fallon federal courts model if you will.

I had Meltzer for Krim Law wonderful professor who has passed away since then by the way for the law students listening to this you have I don't want to get your title wrong when it comes to Heart and Waxler but basically the grand Puba of Heart and Waxler here on this podcast so if you're heading in to Fed courts next year your textbook will be Heart and Waxler and you should probably listen pretty closely all of this.

Alright should we just start at Mallory will you explain the case to us why it's so important start at the very beginning yeah so that I think the tagline is it's very important depending on how.

States and parties react now work backward it's very important because it is a major personal jurisdiction case and which the Supreme Court seems to have put the breaks.

On decades of jurisprudence that we're going in a particular direction okay now let's go way back we have an individual who worked for Norfolk Southern who did not work for Norfolk Southern in Pennsylvania did not live in Pennsylvania Norfolk Southern is not based in Pennsylvania at the time of the relevant events it's headquartered I believe.

And incorporated in Virginia so nothing between this employee and Norfolk Southern takes place in Pennsylvania notwithstanding that that years after employment this individual gets sick and Mr Mallory and he says Norfolk Southern in Pennsylvania now why he did this is presumably why any plane of chooses a particular form the law was probably the most favorable to him there in addition.

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