Byrne v. Kaleiki

22 Haw. 160, 1914 Haw. LEXIS 20
Hawaii Supreme Court·Decided June 9, 1914·Published

Opinion

OPINION OF THE COURT BY

QUARLES, J.

The appellant, the Inter-Island Steam Navigation Company, Limited, was served with garnishee summons in the district court of Honolulu, as provided by the statute of this Territory, appeared as such garnishee, and answered as follows: “That the defendant is a second mate on the steamer ‘Cláudine,’ hired directly by the Inter-Island S. Nav. Co., and not through a shipping commissioner, and at the time of service of process, it has 3% days’ pay due to .defendant, and receives a salary of $92.00 a month, and is still in its employ. That said steamer ‘Olaudine’ is used by the garnishee in the inter-island coast trade from one island to another.” It moved that it be discharged as such garnishee on the ground that the wages of the defendant, as a seaman, are not subject to attachment or garnishment under the provisions of section 4536 Revised Statutes of the United States. This motion was denied, and the defendant having defaulted, judgment was entered against the defendant, and against the garnishee, in favor of the plaintiff for the sum of the debt and costs, amounting in all to the sum of $92.04, and the garnishee, appellant, was ordered to withhold from the defendant and pay to the plaintiff twenty-five per centum of the wages due to defendant at the time of service of such garnishee summons, and thereafter accruing, until the said judgment should be satisfied. From the judgment so entered the garnishee has appealed directly to this court upon the point of law, whether or not the wages of the defendant, as a seaman, are exempt from attachment or garnishment under the provisions of section 4536 Revised Statutes of the United States. The garnishment process shown by the record is authorized under the statutes of this Territory, and the appeal herein is in all things regular, and vests jurisdiction in this court. The judg[162] ment must be affirmed, unless the contention of the garnishee that the wages of the defendant are exempt from attachment or garnishment by reason of said statute, is correct.

In the case of Schnack v. Clark, 21 Haw. 661, this court, recently, after full and careful consideration, passed upon this question in a similar case, and held that the wages of seamen engaged in the coastwise trade, when employed by the master of owner of the vessel, and not through a shipping commissioner, are not exempt from attachment or garnishment by a creditor. After further consideration we see no reason for coming to a different conclusion, and reaffirm the decision in Schnack v. Clark, supra. The several acts of Congress relating to the subject-matter, and the authorities deciding this question, both in the affirmative and in the negative, were so fully considered and discussed by this court in Schnack v. Clark, supra, that no useful purpose would be subserved by again considering and discussing them here. With a few additional suggestions we will base our decision in this case upon the authority of the decision in Schnack v. Clark, supra.

A diversity of opinion has been expressed as to whether the original shipping commissioners’ act of June 7, 1892 (17 Stat. L. 262), affected seamen engaged upon vessels in the coastwise trade, or if so, whether or not the act of Congress of June 9, 1874 (18 Stat. L. 64), repealed the original act in so far as seamen engaged upon vessels in the coastwise trade, other than between Atlantic and Pacific coast ports, are concerned. The Supreme Court of the United States in United States v. The Grace Lothrop, 95 U. S. 527, 532, held that the original act of June 7, 1872, did not apply to vessels engaged in the coast-wise trade except between Atlantic and Pacific coast ports, but said that if there was any doubt, on that point that it had been removed by the amendatory act of June 9, 1874, wherein it was provided that none of the provisions of the original act should apply to vessels engaged in the coastwise trade except between the Atlantic and Pacific coasts. This ruling was followed in United States v. Smith, 95 U. S. 536. The. apparent [163] object of the act of June 9, 1874, giving to the language thereof its usual signification, is to take out of the operation of the act of June 7, 1872 (the shipping commissioners’ act, within which is included section 4536 Rev. Stat. of the United States), vessels engaged in the coastwise trade other than those engaged in trade between the Atlantic and Pacific coasts, if the same were included at all in the original act. Such was the conclusion of the court in the two cases last cited, and this conclusion is manifestly correct. In Wilder v. Inter-Istand Steam Navigation Co., 211 U. S. 239, this question was mentioned as not having been argued, or presented by the assignment of errors, and, therefore, not decided, the court treating the shipping commissioners’ act in a general way, and not interpreting that portion of it found in section 4536 Revised Statutes of the United States with reference to subsequent amendatory acts.

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Byrne v. Kaleiki, 22 Haw. 160, 1914 Haw. LEXIS 20 (haw 1914).

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Related

United States v. THE" GRACE LOTHROP"
95 U.S. 527 (Supreme Court, 1877)
United States v. Smith
95 U.S. 536 (Supreme Court, 1877)
Wilder v. Inter-Island Steam Navigation Co.
211 U.S. 239 (Supreme Court, 1908)
Schnack v. Clark
21 Haw. 661 (Hawaii Supreme Court, 1913)