[16] Harding v. Harding, 198 U.S. 317 (1905). The following cases further illustrate the application of the clause when its protection is sought by a defendant. Such claim must be specific, Wabash R. Co. v. Flannigan, 192 U.S. 29, 37 (1904). See also American Exp. Co. v. Mullins, 212 U.S. 311 (1909). The burden is upon the party making it to establish the failure of a court to give to decrees of a federal court and the court of another State the due effect to which they are entitled. Commercial Pub. Co. v. Beckwith, 188 U.S. 567, 573 (1903). However, by defending on the merits, after pleading and relying upon a foreign judgment, a party does not waive the benefits of an alleged estoppel arising from the foreign judgment. Harding v. Harding, 198 U.S. 317, 330 (1905). Nor is a decree of dismissal, not on the merits, a bar to suit in another jurisdiction. Swift v. McPherson, 232 U.S. 51 (1914). Nor is an entry of discontinuance. In allowing the plaintiff to show that such entry of discontinuance was not intended by the parties as a release and satisfaction of the cause of action, but was the result of a promissory agreement by the defendant which was never complied with, the Court in the forum State was not refusing full faith and credit to the judgment. Such evidence was properly allowed, not to contradict the legal import of said judgment, but to show the true meaning of the parties to the suit in agreeing upon its discontinuance. Jacobs v. Marks, 182 U.S. 583, 593 (1901).
[17] Anglo-American Provision Co. v. Davis Provision Co., 191 U.S. 373 (1903).
[18] Fauntleroy v. Lum, 210 U.S. 230 (1908). Justice Holmes, who spoke for the Court in both cases, asserted in his opinion in the latter that the New York statute was "directed to jurisdiction," the Mississippi statute to "merits," but four Justices could not grasp the distinction.
[19] Kenney v. Supreme Lodge, 252 U.S. 411 (1920), and cases there cited. Holmes again spoke for the Court. See also Cook, The Powers of Congress Under the Full Faith and Credit Clause, 28 Yale L.J. 421, 434 (1919).
[20] Broderick v. Rosner, 294 U.S. 629 (1935), affirmed in Hughes v. Fetter, 341 U.S. 609 (1951).
[21] Union National Bank v. Lamb, 337 U.S. 38 (1949); see also Roche v. McDonald, 275 U.S. 449 (1928).
[22] Embry v. Palmer, 107 U.S. 3, 13 (1883).
[23] Titus v. Wallick, 306 U.S. 282, 291-292 (1939).
[24] Morris v. Jones, 329 U.S. 545 (1947).
[25] Thus why should not a judgment for alimony be made directly enforceable in sister States instead of merely furnishing the basis of an action in debt? See Thompson v. Thompson, 226 U.S. 551 (1913).