KWS Inc., a Member of the Thiele Group v. Eric Scalla

As this Court long has made clear, the Supremacy Clause of the United States Constitution “imposes on state courts a constitutional duty ‘to proceed in such manner that all the substantial rights of the parties under controlling federal law [are] protected.’” Felder v. Casey, 487 U.S. 131, 151 (1988) (quoting Garrett v. Moore-McCormack Co., 317 U.S. 239, 245 (1942)). Thus, while the States “retain the authority to prescribe the rules and procedures governing suits in their courts[,]” id. at 141, “that authority does not extend so far as to permit States to place conditions on the vindication of a federal right.” Id. at 147. That means, as relevant here, that state procedural law “cannot control the privilege of removal granted by the federal [removal] statute.” Chicago, R.I. & P.R. Co. v. Stude, 346 U.S. 574, 580 (1954). In this case, Pennsylvania’s state courts violated these bedrock principles of federal-law supremacy when they affirmed a default judgment against Petitioner because Petitioner failed to ask a federal district court to open the state court default following removal of the underlying suit, even though no federal law requires that procedural step. This Petition presents the following question: Whether a state court may require a federalcourt litigant that has exercised its federal statutory right of removal following the state court’s entry of a default to petition the federal court to open the default as a prerequisite to obtaining relief from the default in state court following a remand?