Can a state court deny jurisdiction in an action at law where the complaint is insufficient to state a cause of action?

Of course I realize that the question of the jurisdiction of a state court is peculiarly one of state cognizance where the question is one of applying and construing constitutional or statutory provisions giving or withholding jurisdiction, but we are not confronted with such a problem, nor are we likely to be in a state where full jurisdiction is given by constitutional provision in all actions at law. This is an action at law. True, the decision in Brecht v. Hammons, supra, was also one at law, but are we to assume that because the court there denied jurisdiction in that action at law we must deny jurisdiction in a different, in fact in all actions at law, where the complaint is insufficient to state a cause of action? In short, must we say that a rule applied in a particular case, dealing with a particular subject-matter, must be applied to all cases, even though it be conceded to be erroneous, and thus the whole doctrine of res judicata be impregnated with the error. My answer to these questions is twofold. (1) We are not bound to follow and apply an erroneous rule of law to an entirely different state of facts. (2) We are never compelled to follow the state court in the application of a general principle of law.

[80 F.2d 360]