[721] Ibid. 319.
[722] 339 U.S. 643 (1950).
[723] Ibid. 647-649.—Concerning the holding in Minnesota Ass'n. v. Benn, 261 U.S. 140 (1923), that a similar Minnesota mail order insurance company could not be viewed as doing business in Montana where the claimant-plaintiff lived, and that the circumstances under which its Montana contracts, executed and to be performed in Minnesota, were consummated could not support in implication that the foreign insurer had consented to be sued in Montana, the majority asserted that the "narrow grounds relied on by the Court in the Benn Case cannot be deemed controlling."
Declaring that what is necessary to sustain a suit by a policyholder in Virginia against a foreign insurer is not determinative when the State seeks to regulate solicitation within its borders, Justice Douglas, in a concurring opinion, emphasized that it is the nature of the State's action that determines the degree of activity in a State necessary for satisfying the requirements of due process, and that solicitation by existing members operates as though the insurer "had formally designated Virginia members as its agents."
Insisting that "an in personam judgment cannot be based upon service by registered letter on a nonresident corporation or a natural person, neither of whom has ever been" in Virginia, Justice Minton, with whom Justice Jackson was associated in a dissenting opinion, would have dismissed the appeal on the ground that "Virginia has not claimed the power to require [the insurer] * * * to appoint the Secretary of State as their agent for service of process, nor have [its] courts rendered judgment in a suit where service was made in that manner." He would therefore let Virginia "go through this shadow-boxing performance in order to publicize the activities of" the insurer.—Justices Reed and Frankfurter joined this dissent on the merits.—Ibid. 655-656, 658, 659.
In Perkins v. Benguet Mining Co., 342 U.S. 437 (1952) it was held, that the State of Ohio was free either to open its courts, or to refuse to do so, to a foreign corporation owning gold and silver mines in the Philippine Islands, but temporarily (during Japanese occupation) carrying on a part of its general business in Ohio, including directors meetings, business correspondence, banking, etc. Two members of the Court dissented, contending that what it was doing was "giving gratuitously an advisory opinion to the Ohio Supreme Court. [They] would dismiss the writ [of certiorari] as improvidently granted." The case is obviously too atypical to offer much promise of importance as a precedent.
[724] Arndt v. Griggs, 134 U.S. 316, 321 (1890).
[725] Ballard v. Hunter, 204 U.S. 241, 254 (1907); Pennoyer v. Neff, 95 U.S. 714 (1878).
[726] Dewey v. Des Moines, 173 U.S. 193, 203 (1899); Pennoyer v. Neff, 95 U.S. 714 (1878).
[727] American Land Co. v. Zeiss, 219 U.S. 47 (1911).