Dodge v. Norlin

133 F. 363, 66 C.C.A. 425, 1904 U.S. App. LEXIS 4421
CourtCourt of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit
DecidedNovember 11, 1904
DocketNo. 2,091
StatusPublished
Cited by40 cases

This text of 133 F. 363 (Dodge v. Norlin) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Dodge v. Norlin, 133 F. 363, 66 C.C.A. 425, 1904 U.S. App. LEXIS 4421 (8th Cir. 1904).

Opinion

SANBORN, Circuit Judge,

after stating the case as above, delivered the opinion of the court.

The appellant is met at the threshold of his case by a motion to dismiss his appeal upon the ground that the judgment which has determined that his mortgage lien upon the property and the proceeds of the property covered by it is void in the face of the [365]*365attack of the trustee of the bankrupt, is not subject to review by appeal.

The provisions of the Bankruptcy law which relate to the question presented by this motion are:

“The Circuit Courts of Appeals of the United States * * * are hereby invested with appellate jurisdiction of controversies arising in bankruptcy proceedings from the courts of bankruptcy from which they have appellate jurisdiction in other cases.” Section 24a.
“The several Circuit Courts of Appeals shall have jurisdiction in equity, either interlocutory or final, to superintend and revise in matter of law the proceedings of the several inferior courts of bankruptcy within their jurisdiction.” Section 24b.
“That appeals, as in equity cases, may be taken in bankruptcy proceedings from the courts of bankruptcy to the Circuit Court of Appeals of the United States * * * in the following cases, to-wit: (1) from a judgment adjudging or refusing to adjudge the defendant a bankrupt; (2) from a judgment granting or denying a discharge; and (3) from a judgment allowing or rejecting a debt or claim of five hundred dollars or over. Such appeal shall be taken within ten days after the judgment appealed from has been rendered.” Section 25a.

3 U. S. Comp. St. 1901, pp. 3431, 3432, 30 Stat. 553, c. 541.

Under the judiciary act of March 3, 1891, the Circuit Courts of Appeals had “jurisdiction to review by appeal or by writ of error final decision in the District Court and the existing Circuit Courts in all cases other than those provided for in the preceding section of this act, unless otherwise provided by law.” 1 U. S. Comp. St. 1901, p. 549, section 6, c. 517, 26 Stat. 828.

The case here under consideration was not provided for in the preceding section of the act or in any other way than in section 6. The decision of the District Court that the lien by mortgage claimed by the appellant could not be enforced against the trustee who had seized the property which constituted the security for his debt was a final decision. It rendered the question of the mortgagee’s right to his security res adjudicata. It finally determined a separate collateral controversy distinct from the general subject of litigation in the proceeding in bankruptcy. Withenbury v. U. S., 5 Wall. 819, 18 L. Ed. 613; Williams v. Morgan, 111 U. S. 684, 4 Sup. Ct. 638, 28 L. Ed. 559; Standley v. Roberts, 8 C. C. A. 305, 308, 59 Fed. 836, 839; Salmon v. Mills, 68 Fed. 180, 15 C. C. A. 356; Central Trust Co. v. Marietta, etc., Ry. Co., 48 Fed. 850, 1 C. C. A. 116; Grant v. Railroad Co., 50 Fed. 795, 1 C. C. A. 681. If this controversy had arisen in a federal court when it was not sitting in bankruptcy, the final decision of it would have been reviewable in this court by writ of error or appeal. Section 25a vests the Courts of Appeals with appellate jurisdiction of controversies arising in bankruptcy proceedings of which they have jurisdiction in other cases. As this court has appellate jurisdiction of this controversy in other cases in which it might be presented in a federal court, it has such jurisdiction when it arises in proceedings in bankruptcy.

The jurisdiction of the court of bankruptcy to render its judgment in this case was derived from section 2 (7) of the bankruptcy act of 1898, which empowers that court to “cause the estates of [366]*366bankrupts to be collected, reduced to money arid distributed and determine controversies in relation thereto.” It was these controversies, among others, over which section 24a vested appellate jurisdiction in the Circuit Courts of Appeals. Hewit v. Berlin Machine Works, 194 U. S. 296, 24 Sup. Ct. 690, 691, 48 L. Ed. 986;. Steele v. Buel, 104 Fed. 968, 969, 44 C. C. A. 287, 288; Cunningham v. German Ins. Bank, 103 Fed. 933, 935, 43 C. C. A. 377, 380; In re Columbia Real Estate Co., 112 Fed. 643, 645, 50 C. C. A. 406, 408.

Counsel for the appellee have persuasively argued in opposition to this conclusion that this appeal ought not to be maintained (1) because the allowance of appeals by section 25a from the decisions of courts of bankruptcy within ten days after their rendition in the three classes of cases there specified excludes appellate jurisdiction in those courts in all other cases, and the case at bar does not belong to either of these three classes (In re Whitener, 105 Fed. 180, 186, 44 C. C. A. 434, 440; In re Columbia Real Estate Co., 112 Fed. 643, 50 C. C. A. 406; Fisher v. Cushman, 103 Fed. 860, 43 C. C. A. 381, 51 L. R. A. 292; Hutchinson v. Le Roy, 113 Fed. 202, 51 C. C. A. 159) ; and (2) because, as they contend, no appeal may be maintained from any decision which may be superintended and revised in matter of law under section 24b, and the judgment in this case is susceptible of such superintendence and revision (In re Worcester County, 102 Fed. 808, 813, 42 C. C. A. 637; Hutchinson v. Le Roy, 113 Fed. 202, 51 C. C. A. 159; In re Good, 99 Fed. 389, 39 C. C. A. 581). They have called attention to some of the cases which have been cited, and some of these cases tend to sustain the premises upon which this argument is based. Nevertheless these premises have never appeared to this court to be sound. The provision for appeals within 10 days from the renditions of the decisions in the three classes of cases treated in section 25a has never seemed to us to repeal, revoke, or exclude the plenary appellate power vested in the Courts of Appeals by section 24a to review the decisions of separable controversies in reference to the title, possession, or distribution of the estates of bankrupts which the courts of bankruptcy may render in the course of their proceedings. Steele v. Buel, 104 Fed. 968, 969, 44 C. C. A. 287, 288.

The purpose of Congress in the enactment of the judiciary act of 1891, and the effect accomplished by that law, were to provide an opportunity for a review either in the Supreme Court or in the Circuit Court of Appeals of the final decisions by the Circuit Courts and by the District Courts of all the controversies which they might determine. It was not, in our opinion, the purpose of Congress to strike down any portion of this grant or to impair in any way the appellate jurisdiction thus given by the enactment of the bankruptcy law. On the other hand, the provisions of the bankrupt act clearly show that it intended thereby to preserve this jurisdiction over the controversies to which it had already attached in other cases, and to supplement it with the grant of authority to review the decisions of controversies which had not theretofore been within that jurisdiction. Before the passage of the bankrupt act the Courts of Appeals had appellate, jurisdiction of controver[367]*367síes arising in the federal courts over the title to and liens upon the property of insolvents who might become bankrupts. Congress provided by section 24a that the Courts of Appeals should still have jurisdiction over those controversies when they arose in bankruptcy proceedings.

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Bluebook (online)
133 F. 363, 66 C.C.A. 425, 1904 U.S. App. LEXIS 4421, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/dodge-v-norlin-ca8-1904.