Adams v. Douglas County

1 F. Cas. 106
CourtUnited States Circuit Court
DecidedMay 15, 1868
StatusPublished

This text of 1 F. Cas. 106 (Adams v. Douglas County) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering United States Circuit Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Adams v. Douglas County, 1 F. Cas. 106 (uscirct 1868).

Opinion

DELAHAY, District Judge.

These two suits concern, substantially, the same subject-matter. The first is instituted for the purpose of enjoining the county of Douglas, through its corporate authorities, from issuing certain bonds to the amount of three, hundred thousand dollars, to the Leavenworth, Lawrence and Galveston Railroad; the second is to enjoin the treasurer, and other officers of the. county, from the collection of a tax imposed by the commissioners, for the payment of the coupon due January 1, 1869, upon a bond for three hundred thousand dollars already issued, and from the application of the proceeds of such tax to the liquidation of the coupon. The facts in brief are, that the question of issuing bonds to the amount of three hundred thousand dollars to this company was submitted, by an order of the board of county commissioners, to the voters of the county, by virtue of an act of the legislature of the. state as far back at ’ he 8th day of February, 1867.

The terms and conditions upon which the issuance of the bonds was to be made are expressly stated in the submission, as follows: “Shall the county of Douglas subscribe three hundred thousand dollars, in full paid stock, to the capital stock of the Leavenworth, Lawrence and Galvestou Railroad Company, and issue bonds of the county therefor, in bonds payable thirty years after date, bearing interest at the rate of seven per cent, per annum from the date of delivery, to be issued to said company when twenty-four miles of s.iid railroad track shall be completed and in full operation from Lawrence, Douglas county, via Baldwin City: provided, that no greater amount of bonds shall be issued than the amount of stock issued by the railroad company to the county of Douglas.

“2. The conditions of the above is with the express understanding and agreement, that the said company shall relinquish all claim to the bonds for subscription of stock heretofore voted to said company, to wit, on the 12th day of September, 1865.” The vote was taken with this result: Two thousand one hundred and seventy for the proposition, and four hundred and twenty-four against, a majority of little less than five-sixths of the entire vote.

The board- of commissioners, by resolution, on the 15th day of April, 1868, reciting the above submission, the vote and the result, declared that, the company having complied with all the requirements, stock to the amount mentioned should be subscribed, and the bonds issued. Since this time, a series of suits in the state courts, some of which [107]*107(though, by no means pertinently) were íe-eited in the second bill, have been instituted for the purpose of restraining, by injunction, the said board from issuing these bonds and thus subscribing to the capital stock of the company. Now, for the first time, the same species of litigation is proposed in the federal courts. Phineas Adams, a nonresident of the state of Kansas, and a resident of the state of New Hampshire, as the complainant, has filed, on the equity side ef the circuit court of the United States for the district of Kansas, the several bills mentioned, for the purpose of obtaining an injunction as already stated.

It will be seen, from this review of the facts, that the cases affect very large pecuniary interests, and the nature of the work, the early completion of which may much depend upon the aid contributed by the subscription for its stock, shows that the interests other than those merely pecuniary must be even greater. Not to introduce into this opinion the ordinary speculations as to the advantages to arise to the state, and especially to that region through which the proposed road will pass, it will suffice to call attention to the vote of the people of Douglas county, in illustration of their own estimate of these advantages. But in a country where railroad intercommunication commands so large a share of public interest, and elicits such immense outlays of capital, I might feel myself justified in enlarging upon this subject, were it not that, holding the scales of justice, and performing the duties of her minister. I am not allowed to be swayed from her díctales by any consideration of the character of one or the other óf the litigants in her courts. The complainant is entitled, small though his interest may be in comparison to that appertaining to the other parties in this proceeding, to have that interest protected, provided he brings himself within the class of persons and exhibits an interest over which this court has jurisdiction. The respondents have moved for a dissolution of the injunctions which had been temporarily issued in the two cases, and insist, a3 grounds for their motion, from the showing of the bill and the papers filed in the eases: First. That this court has no jurisdiction. Second. That there are not such equities disclosed as entitle the complainants to a continuation of this relief. These propositions will be disposed of in their order.

. The jurisdiction of the courts of the United States is prescribed by law. that of the circuit court included. Its jurisdiction is derived from the nature of the subject in controversy in some cases, and in others from the character of the partios, and in some from the union of those several elements. The latter is the ease in the present instance. It must appear in the bill that the complainant is a non-resident of the state, to enable him to invoke the aid of this court, otherwise he is remitted for redress to the courts of the state. In addition to this, it must appear in the bill that there is in controversy, or in jeopardy by the action of the respondents, whom he desires to restrain, an amount exceeding five hundred dollars. Judiciary Act 1789, c. 20, § 11, [1 Stat. 78.] The non-residence of the complainant sufficiently appears, and the respondents make no point to the contrary. Whether the bill shows more than the sum of five hundred dollars to be involved in the proceeding is another question. The respondents say, as one of their grounds of motion, that it does not. The complainant insists that it does. If, in any proper sense, the sum of three hundred thousand dollars, the amount of bonds the issue of which is asked to be enjoined, may be said to be in controversy, then of course, in the first case, no question can exist. There is a sense in which this amount may be said to be in controversy. But is it a sense which will determine the question in favor of the complainant? To be in eontro* versy certainly can not, properly, be understood in any other sense than as being in an attitude to be decided in favor of, or against, the party who asks the interference of the court. While that amount is really the subject of which the court is asked to adjudicate, it is not the amount which the complainant claims that he is in jeopardy of losing by the respondents unless they are restrained.

We do not see how any other test of jurisdiction can be maintained, than that when more than five hundred dollars are required as the basis of jurisdiction, it must mean an amount exceeding five hundred dollars which the plaintiff is liable to lose or gain by the result of the suit. It could never have been intended by the act of congress, that because a subject matter may have been involved in the proceeding, worth more than five hundred dollars, therefore any non-resident may have brought his suit in the circuit court, even although his own interest may have been a very small amount of the item of property. The result of such a doctrine would be, or might be, to throng these courts with proceedings in which a mere trifle might be claimed by the complainant, simply because that trifle comprised a part— a small part — of some large interest.

Free access — add to your briefcase to read the full text and ask questions with AI

Related

Strawbridge v. Curtiss
7 U.S. 267 (Supreme Court, 1806)
Doolittle v. . Supervisors of Broome County
18 N.Y. 155 (New York Court of Appeals, 1858)
Roosevelt v. . Draper
23 N.Y. 318 (New York Court of Appeals, 1861)
Mallett v. Weybossett Bank
1 Barb. 217 (New York Supreme Court, 1847)
O'Brien v. Norwich & Worcester Rail-Road
17 Conn. 372 (Supreme Court of Connecticut, 1845)
City of Atchison v. Bartholow
4 Kan. 124 (Supreme Court of Kansas, 1866)
Missouri River, Fort Scott & Gulf R. R. v. Morris
7 Kan. 210 (Supreme Court of Kansas, 1871)
Mo. Riv., Ft. Scott & Gulf R. R. v. Wheaton
7 Kan. 232 (Supreme Court of Kansas, 1871)
Kansas Pacific Railway Co. v. Russell
8 Kan. 558 (Supreme Court of Kansas, 1871)
Parker v. Challiss
9 Kan. 155 (Supreme Court of Kansas, 1872)
Gilmore v. Norton
10 Kan. 491 (Supreme Court of Kansas, 1872)
City of Lawrence v. Killam
11 Kan. 499 (Supreme Court of Kansas, 1873)
Hudson v. Commiss'rs of Atchison County
12 Kan. 140 (Supreme Court of Kansas, 1873)
Challiss v. Board of Comm'rs
15 Kan. 49 (Supreme Court of Kansas, 1875)
State v. McLaughlin
15 Kan. 228 (Supreme Court of Kansas, 1875)
Hagaman v. Comm'rs of Cloud County
19 Kan. 394 (Supreme Court of Kansas, 1877)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
1 F. Cas. 106, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/adams-v-douglas-county-uscirct-1868.