Hecker v. Fowler was a United States Supreme Court case that dealt with the issue of whether or not an individual could be held liable for damages caused by their negligence in failing to properly secure goods entrusted to them. The plaintiff, Hecker, had hired Fowler as a bailee and entrusting him with certain goods which he failed to properly secure resulting in damage being done when they were stolen from his possession. Hecker sued Fowler for the value of the lost goods claiming that it was due to his negligence that they were taken away from him. The court ruled in favor of Hecker stating that even though there was no contract between them, since Fowler had accepted responsibility for securing these items he should have been more diligent and thus is responsible for any losses incurred due to his failure do so adequately.

In Hecker v. Fowler, the Supreme Court was asked to decide whether a state court had jurisdiction over a case involving citizens of different states. The majority opinion held that it did not have such jurisdiction and dismissed the case. In his dissenting opinion, Justice Grier argued that there is no constitutional provision which prohibits state courts from exercising their authority in cases between citizens of different states. He further noted that Congress has never passed any law prohibiting this type of action by state courts and thus they should be allowed to exercise their power as provided for under the Constitution's Supremacy Clause. Furthermore, he argued that if Congress wanted to limit or restrict this power then it would have done so explicitly through legislation rather than leaving it up to interpretation by the Supreme Court justices themselves.