Brown v. Fletcher's Estate

109 N.W. 686, 146 Mich. 401, 1906 Mich. LEXIS 920
CourtMichigan Supreme Court
DecidedNovember 13, 1906
DocketDocket No. 115
StatusPublished
Cited by16 cases

This text of 109 N.W. 686 (Brown v. Fletcher's Estate) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Michigan Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Brown v. Fletcher's Estate, 109 N.W. 686, 146 Mich. 401, 1906 Mich. LEXIS 920 (Mich. 1906).

Opinion

Ostrander, J.

(after stating the facts). The question presented is whether the records and judgment put in evidence by the claimant establish his demand upon the defendant estate, and this is answered by determining the effect which shall be given here to the proceedings and the decree of the Massachusetts court.

“ By the Constitution of the United States it is declared that full faith and credit shall be given in each State to the public acts, records, and judicial proceedings of every other State. And Congress, in pursuance of the power given them by the Constitution in a succeeding clause, have declared that the judgments of State courts shall have the same faith and credit in other States as they have in the State where they are rendered. They are therefore put upon the same footing as domestic judgments. But this does not prevent an inquiry into the jurisdiction of the court in which the original judgment was rendered to pronounce the judgment, nor an inquiry into the right of the State to exercise authority over the parties or the subject-matter, nor an inquiry whether the judgment is founded in and impeachable for a manifest fraud. The Constitution did not mean to confer any new power upon the States, but simply to regulate the effect of their acknowledged jurisdiction over persons and things within their territory. It did not make the judgments of other States domestic judgments to all intents and purposes, but only gave a general validity, faith, and credit to them as evidence. No execution can issue upon such judgments without a new suit in the tribunals of other States. And they enjoy, not the right of priority or privilege, or lien which they have in the State where they are pronounced, but that only which the lexfori gives to them by its own laws in their character of foreign judgments.” Story on Conflict of Laws (8th Ed.), § 609.

[415]*415Counsel for appellant, as we understand the hriefs, make certain concessions with respect to propositions advanced and discussed at length in the briefs for the appellees, the effect of which concessions is to relieve this court from discussion and application of those'propositions. It is to be added that, whether intended as concessions or as statements arguendo of conqessions which might be safely made, an examination of them and of the authorities discloses no reason for disagreeing with any of them. Thus, for the purposes of this opinion, it is assumed:

1. That the powers of an executor or administrator do not extend beyond the territorial jurisdiction in which he may have qualified.

2. That such executor or administrator cannot sue or be sued in his representative capacity in any other State than that in which he may qualify.

3. That a pending suit may not be revived against a foreign executor who has failed to qualify in the jurisdiction in which the suit is pending.

4. That as between representatives of a decedent’s estate appointed in different States, no privity is, in general, recognized in law as existing.

5. That no State has authority to invade the jurisdiction of. another, and, by service of its process, compel parties resident there to submit their controversies to the determination of its courts.

6. That parties cannot confer jurisdiction over a sub-

ject-matter by their consent upon courts from which the law has withheld it. ' ■

Counsel for both parties are agreed that the Massachu- • setts court acquired jurisdiction of the subject-matter and of the original parties to the suit; that after the death of Mr. Fletcher the suit was properly revived and properly •proceeded to a final decree which had some force and effect:

It is also agreed that the submission of issues to arbitra- • tion was a step merely in the proceedings depending in court; that the decree, and not the award, constituted the •final adjudication. This is in accord with the settled law of the State of Massachusetts. Woodbury v. Proctor, 9 Gray (Mass.), 19; Seavey v. Beckler, 132 Mass. 203; [416]*416Haskell v. Whitney, 12 Mass. 49; Willey v. Durgin, 118 Mass. 64.

In behalf of appellant, the grounds relied upon are somewhat broadly stated in the briefs in the following words:

“ The appellant rests his contention in support of the decree in this case upon the plenary jurisdiction possessed by the supreme judicial court in equity over both the subject-matter of the suit and the person of the defendant, George N. Fletcher, prior to the death of said Fletcher, and which jurisdiction was not lost by reason of his death, but remained fully vested in that court for the purposes of entering the final decree in the cause, notwithstanding the death of said Fletcher. That the jurisdiction over the cause and the parties remained in the Massachusetts court notwithstanding the death of the defendant, George N. Fletcher, because of the stipulation of the parties entered in the cause, and the inherent power of the court. That the jurisdiction- attached to the executors of the deceased, Fletcher, as his personal representatives, and that the service upon them at any place either within or without the territorial jurisdiction of the Massachusetts court of notice of a step in the proceedings- in the cause was within the lawful power of that court to order for the purpose of making its jurisdiction effective and final.

“ It is our contention that, even if counsel for the defendant estate are right in their claim that the court had no power to revive the suit against the executors in Michigan, and that the service of the notice upon them in Michigan did not give the court jurisdiction to make a valid decree against them, still, the suit having been commenced in the lifetime of Fletcher, and process having been served upon him within the jurisdiction of the court, and he having appeared in the cause and litigated the matters involved as above set forth; in other words, that the court having acquired jurisdiction of the subject-matter and of the parties in the lifetime of Fletcher, it had the power to revive the suit against the administrator with the will annexed, and make a decree that would be valid as a claim against his estate in Michigan. * * *

“ If the decree is valid against the estate in Massachusetts — and we shall show that it is — then it is our contention that under article 4, section 1, of the Constitution of the United States, and section 905 of the Revised Statutes of the United States, the decree is valid as a claim against the estate of Fletcher in Michigan.”

[417]*417Two principal propositions are asserted: One, that the lawful course and practice of the Massachusetts court and the relation of the administrator with the will annexed to the court (as a party to the suit properly brought on the record), and to the estate of the decedent (by reason of his privity with the domiciliary executors and the estate), have the effect to make the judgment pronounced by that court conclusive and binding upon the estate of Mr. Fletcher wherever found and upon the domiciliary representatives. The other position is that the Massachusetts tribunal acquired, by virtue of the stipulation of the parties, jurisdiction to pronounce, after the death of Mr.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
109 N.W. 686, 146 Mich. 401, 1906 Mich. LEXIS 920, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/brown-v-fletchers-estate-mich-1906.