Dillon v. Kansas City S. B. Ry. Co.

43 F. 109, 1890 U.S. App. LEXIS 1619
CourtU.S. Circuit Court for the District of Western Missouri
DecidedAugust 18, 1890
StatusPublished
Cited by6 cases

This text of 43 F. 109 (Dillon v. Kansas City S. B. Ry. Co.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering U.S. Circuit Court for the District of Western Missouri primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Dillon v. Kansas City S. B. Ry. Co., 43 F. 109, 1890 U.S. App. LEXIS 1619 (circtwdmo 1890).

Opinion

Philips, J.

The discussion in this case has taken wide range, covering many questions, both as to the regularity of the proceedings had in the state court and the right of the mortgagees or trustees to be made-parties to the condemnation proceeding, etc. On many of these questions I entertain decided opinions, but their expression here is rendered unnecessary in view of the conclusion reached upon a preliminary or jurisdictional question. Section 720, Rev. St. U. S., declares that—

[111]*111“The writ of injunction shall not be granted by any court of the United States to stay proceedings in a court of the state, except in cases where such injunction may be authorized by any Jaw relating to proceedings in bankruptcy. ”

This restriction had its root in that doctrine of the law so aptly expressed by Mr. Justice Grier in Peck v. Jenness, 7 How. 624:

“It is a doctrine of law too long established to require a citation of authorities that, where a court lias jurisdiction, it has a light to decide every question which occurs in the cause, and, whether its decision be correct or otherwise, its judgment, till reversed, is regarded as binding in every other court; and that, where the jurisdiction of a court, and the right of a plaintiff to prosecute his suit in it, have once attached, that right cannot be arrested or,taken away by proceedings in another court. These rules have their foundation, not merely in comity, but in necessity; for, if one may enjoin, the other may retort by injunction, and thus the parties be without remedy, being liable to a process for contempt in one, if they dare to proceed in the other. Neither can one take property from the custody of the other by replevin, or any other process, for this would produce a conflict extremely embarrassing to the administration of justice. In the case of Kennedy v. Earl of Cassillis, 2 Swanst. 313, Lord Eldon at one time granted an injunction to restrain a party from proceeding in a suit pending in the court of sessions of Scotland, which, on more mature reflection, he dissolved, because it was admitted if the court of chancery could in that way restrain proceedings in a foreign tribunal, the court of sessions might equally enjoin the parties from proceeding in chancery, and thus they would be unable to proceed in either court.’’

In the adoption of the addition to the act establishing the judicial courts of the United States as early as March 2, 1793, this limitation on the jurisdiction of federal courts was placed upon the statutes to give the force of positive law to this rule of comity, in order to preserve the essential and necessary comity between the federal and state courts, and to maintain the independence of each. This rule was applied in Diggs v. Wolcott, 4 Cranch, 179, where ail action was first begun in the state court upon a certain instrument of writing. Afterwards defendant began suit in chancery in the state court to cancel the instrument, and enjoin the plaintiff from proceeding in the law action. On removal of this chancery suit to the United States court, the action was dismissed for the reason that the federal court under the statute in question was forbidden to grant the injunction. This rule has been applied to a variety of actions. U. S. v. Collins, 4 Blatchf. 156; Fisk v. Railway Co., 6 Blatchf. 399; Riggs v. Johnson Co., 6 Wall. 195; Orton v. Smith, 18 How. 265; Peck v. Jenness, supra; Haines v. Carpenter, 91 U. S. 257; In re Sawyer, 124 U. S. 219, 220, 8 Sup. Ct. Rep. 482; Yick Wo v. Crowley, 26 Fed. Rep. 207.

It can make no difference, as claimed by some of the counsel in argument, that the order of restraint asked for would go against the corporation and its agents and servants, and not against the court as such, or any officer thereof. In Peck v. Jenness, supra, the court, meeting a like suggestion, says:

[112]*112“The fact that an injunction goes only to the parties before the court, and not to the court, is no evasion of the difficulties that are the necessary result of ,an attempt.to exercise the power over a party who is a litigant in another and independent forum.”

Whether the effect of the injunction is to stay or prevent the operation tion of litigation in limine, or a judgment rendered or to be rendered therein, in the state court first acquiring jurisdiction, it falls within the terms of the prohibition. Haines v. Carpenter, 91 U. S. 257; Dial v. Reynolds, 96 U. S. 340. In Rensselaer & S. R. Co. v. Bennington & R. R. Co., 18 Fed. Rep. 617, the bill was brought to restrain the defendant road from entering upon the orator’s railroad under a claim of authority of an act of the state legislature. The ground of relief claimed was that the legislative act was beyond the power of the legislature, and therefore gave no authority to the railroad company to px*oceed thereunder. The prayer of the bill was that the defendaxxt, its officers, agents, and workmen, be restrained from running upon that part of the road, and for further relief. The court says:

“As no action or interference except such as may be authorized and had under the proceedings in the supreme court is threatened or apprehended, there is no relief to whieh the orator is here entitled, unless it is relief from those proceedings. The prosecution of those proceedings, or the carrying out of such order or decree as the supreme court may make.upon them, must he restrained if anything effectual is to be done in this case. The restraint of the execution of complete fulfillment of proceedings of a judicial nature is in effect the same as the restraint of the proceedings themselves. ”

Mr. Justice Bradley, in Haines v. Carpenter, supra, said:

. “In the first place, the great object of the suit is to enjoin and stop litigation in the state courts, and to bring all the litigated questions before the circuit court. This is one of the things which the federal courts are expressly prohibited from doing.”

So here, the Belt Railway Company, under the authority of the state statute, claims that in the condemnation proceeding in progress in the state court, after the coming in and filing of the report of the commissioners, and the payment into the clerk’s office of the damages assessed, it has a right to enter upon the tracks of the Missouri Pacific Railway Company for the construction of the proposed crossixig. The contention of counsel for the Missouri Pacific is that such asserted right is premature at said stage of the proceeding in the state court, and cannot be lawfully asserted until after disposition of the exceptions to the report, and after the exercise of the right of a trial de novo before a jury at its demand. But that is the very question in controversy, and pending in the state court, which it is competexit to deci,de; and ,the unavoidable effect of*a decree of injxxnction from this court restraining the Belt Railway Company, its agents and servants, from entering upon such woi’k.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
43 F. 109, 1890 U.S. App. LEXIS 1619, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/dillon-v-kansas-city-s-b-ry-co-circtwdmo-1890.