Allen v. Buchanan

97 Ala. 399
CourtSupreme Court of Alabama
DecidedJuly 1, 1892
StatusPublished
Cited by12 cases

This text of 97 Ala. 399 (Allen v. Buchanan) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Alabama primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Allen v. Buchanan, 97 Ala. 399 (Ala. 1892).

Opinion

McCLELLAN, J.

— The bill in this case is filed by W. B. Buchanan, who is a resident citizen of Alabama, against Claude A. Allen, William Bedd, and H. Lee Brown, who are also resident citizens of this State doing business as partners under the firm name of Allen, Bedd & Company, and against The Traders Insurance Company of New Orleans, which is alleged to be a citizen of the State of Louisiana. Its purpose is to restrain the prosecution of a suit by said Allen, Bedd & Co. in a civil Court of the Parish of Orleans in the State of Louisiana, against the complainant the .object of which is to collect from said insurance company, certain six hundred dollars, which said company owes complainant ; the company being also before that court by process analogous to a summons in garnishment under our laws. The abstract equity of the present bill is rested on the-fact that the fund thus sought to be subjected to the debt oiJAllen, Bedd & Co. is exempted to the complainant under the laws of Alabama, where all the parties in interest re[400]*400side, and. is so claimed in the bill; and it is moreover averred that prior to the institution of the proceeding in Louisiana, Allen, Redd & Co. sued Buchanan on the same cause of action in this State and summoned said insurance company to answer whether and in what sum it was indebted to the defendant in that action, that the garnishee appeared and answered indebtedness in the sum of six hundred dollars, that thereupon the defendant claimed the same as exempted to him, and that plaintiff having failed to contest said claim of exemption, the Birmingham City Court, in which the case was pending, “adjudged that complainant was entitled to the amount so due as exempt, and discharged the same from said garnishment.” This is the fund which is now involved in the' proceeding in Louisiana.

It can not be doubted that on the averments of the bill the complainant is, legally and equitably entitled to the fund. Under the laws of Alabama, he has the same right to demand and receive the sum due him from the insurance company, as against Allen, Redd & Co. as if they had no claim whatever against him. Nor is it material what effect or whether any effect, is accorded to the judgment of the City Court of Birmingham, discharging the garnishee and holding this money to be exempted to Buchanan, the defendant in that suit and the complainant here. If there had been no previous suit involving the question of exemption and no attempt to adjudicate that question in the courts of Alabama, the complainant on the facts he avers would be and is still entitled under our laws to this fund over any claim Allen, Redd & Co. can have to it if the averments of the bill as to complainant’s not having waived his exemptions against their debt be true. And the case may in this respect stand, on the averments of the bill, on the claim of exemptions therein brought forward wholly regardless of whether any previous claim had been advanced and adjudged in favor of complainant or not. — Zelnicker v. Brigham & Co., 74 Ala. 598.

Complainant’s right to this money exists, however, only by force of the local law of Alabama which has no extra territorial operation and which will not be enforced in the courts of Louisiana. But the fact that this legal right of his can not be asserted in the courts of that State, since one jurisdiction does not enforce the exemption -statutes of another, so far from militating against the equity of this bill is essentially the basis of its equity. It can make no difference as respects the abstract rights of these parties [401]*401in-, and under tbe law of Alabama, whether they are cognizable in foreign courts or not. "Whether so or not, they are the same here, and the parties are the more entitled to have them declared and effectuated here so far as our courts are capable of declaring and effectuating them because they can not be asserted in the foreign court which is undertaking to deal with the subject matter through its judgments -inter partes regardless of the rights of the parties under the law. In other words, the complainant has a right to this money, which though it is a legal right he cannot assert in the forum where the' respondents are seeking to foreclose it, and where it will be foreclosed unless he can invoke the powers of the Chancery Court to restrain their efforts to that end. This being his only remedy to effectuate his legal rights, the demurrers to the bill which go upon the ground that complainant has an adequate remedy at law were properly overruled.

The main question presented on this appeal, however, is as to the power of the court of chancery, of one State, having-jurisdiction of the parties, to grant relief inter partes in respect of a matter which is situated beyond the territorial jurisdiction of the court, in another State or country. The authorities overwhelmingly support such jurisdiction. Mr. Pomeroy upon this subject says: “Where the subject-matter is situated within another State or country, but the parties within the jurisdiction of the court, any suit may be maintained and remedy granted which directly effect and operate ' upon the person of the defendant and not upon the subject-matter, although the subject-matter is referred to in the decree, and the defendant is ordered to do or to refrain from certain acts toward it, and it is thus ultimately but indirectly effected by the relief granted. As examples of this rule, suits for the specific performance of contracts, for the enforcement of express or implied trusts, for relief on the ground of fraud, actual or constructive, for the final accounting and settlement of a partnership and the like, may be brought in any State where jurisdiction of the defendant’s person is obtained, although the land or other subject-matter is situated in another State or even in a foreign country.” — 3 Pom. Eq. Jur. § 1318. And Judge Story says: “In general, the fact that the property is not within the jurisdiction, constitutes no bar to a proceeding in the court of equity, if the person is within the jurisdiction; for a court of equity acts upon the jjerson; or to use the appropriate phrase, aequitas agit in personam. — Story’s Eq. Pl’d’g. § 489. And to like effect are the following adjudged cases: Penn. v. Lord Baltimore, 1 [402]*402Vesey Sr. 444; Guild v. Guild, 16 Ala. 121; McGee v. Sweeney, 84 Cal. 100; Montgomery v. United, States, 36 Fed. Rep. 4; Davis v. Morris, 76 Va. 21; Carver v. Peck, 131 Mass. 292; Bethell v. Bethell, 92 Ind. 318; Baker v. Rockabrand, 118 Ill. 365; Johnson v. Gibson, 116 Ill. 294; Poindexter v. Burnwell, 82 Va. 507, among many others cited in note to § 1318 Pom. Eq. Jur.

And so long as the relief sought may be worked out directly on the person of the defendant and indirectly through his person on property in a foreign jurisdiction, it is immaterial what form the decree assumes, whether it is affirmative or negative in its effect, whether it commands an act to be done, as, for instance, the execution of a conveyance, or restrains the doing of an act, as, for instance, the alienation of property, the institution or prosecution of suits in other States, ancl the like.

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Bluebook (online)
97 Ala. 399, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/allen-v-buchanan-ala-1892.