First National Bank in St. Louis v. Missouri

263 U.S. 640, 44 S. Ct. 213, 68 L. Ed. 486, 1924 U.S. LEXIS 2831

• Court: Supreme Court of the United States
• Decided: January 28, 1924
• Docket: 252
• Status: Published

Opinions

Mr. Justice Sutherland

delivered the opinion of the Court.

The State of Missouri brought this proceeding in' the nature of quo warranto in the State Supreme Court against the plaintiff in error to determine its authority to establish' and conduct a branch bank in the City of St. Louis. The information avers that the bank was organized under the laws of the United States and was and is engaged in a general banking business in that city at a banking house, .the location of which is given; that, in contravention of its charter and of the act of Congress under which it was incorporated, it has illegally opened and is operating a branch bank for doing a general banking business in a separate building several blocks from its banking house, and proposes to open additional branch banks at various other locations, and that this is in vidlation of a statute of the State expressly prohibiting the establishment of. branch banks. The prayer is that, upon final hearing, the bank be ousted from the privilege of operating this branch bank or any other. A demurrer to the information was interposed and the cause thereupon submitted. The contention of the State was upheld and judgment rendered in accordance with the prayer. 297 Mo. 397.

The correctness of the judgment is challenged under numerous specifications of error presenting federal questions, which, for the purposes of the case, may be considered under two heads: (1) Whether the state statute is valid as applied to national banks; and (2) Whether a proceeding to call a national bank to account for acts of the kind here alleged may be maintained by the State, and whether the form of remedy pursued is sustainable.

First-. The Missouri statute (§ 11737, R: S. Mo., 1919) provides “ that no bank shall maintain in this state a branch bank or receive deposits or pay checks except in its own banking house.” That the facts alleged in the information bring the case within that part of the statute which prohibits the maintenance of branch banks and that the statute applies to national banks is conclusively established by the decision of the state court, and we confine ourselves to the inquiry whether, as thus applied, the statute is valid. .

National banks are brought into existence under federal legislation, are instrumentalities of the Federal Government’ and are necessarily subject to the paramount authority of the United States. Nevertheless, national banks are subject to the laws of a State in respect of their affairs unless such laws interfere with the purposes of their creation, tend to impair or destroy their efficiency as federal agencies or conflict with the paramount law of the United States. National Bank v. Commonwealth, 9 Wall. 353, 362; Davis v. Elmira Savings Bank, 161 U. S. 275, 283. These two cases are cited, and followed in the later case of McClellan v. Chipman, 164 U. S. 347, 357, and the principle which they establish is said to contain a rule and an exception, “ the. rule being the operation of general state laws upon the dealings' and contracts of national banks, the exception being the cessation of the operation of such laws whenever they expressly conflict with the laws of the United States or frustrate the purpose for which national banks were created, or impair their efficiency to discharge the duties imposed upon them by the law of the United States.” See also Waite v. Dowley, 94 U. S. 527, 533. The question is whether the Missouri statute falls within the rule or within the exception.

Does it conflict with the laws of the United States? In our opinion, it does not. The extent of the powers of national banks is to be measured by the terms of the federal statutes relating to such associations, and they can rightfully exercise only such as are expressly granted or such incidental- powers as are necessary to carry on the business for which they are established. Bullard v. Bank, 18 ; Logan County National Bank v. Townsend, 139 U. S. 67, 73; California Bank v. Kennedy, 167 U. S. 362, 366. Among other things the federal law (Rev. Stat., § 5134) provides that the organization certificate of the association shall specifically state “the place where its operations of discount and deposit are to be carried on, designating the State, Territory, or district, and the particular county, city, town, or village.” By another provision (Rev. Stats. § 5190) it is required that “ the usual business of each national banking association shall be transacted at an office or banking-house located in the place specified in its organization certificate.” Strictly, the latter provision, employing, as it does, the article “ an,” to qualify words in the singular number, would confine the association to one office or banking house. We are asked, however, to construe it otherwise in view of the rule that “ words importing the singular number may extend and be applied to several persons or things.” Rev. Stats., § i. But obviously this rule is not one to be applied except where it is necessary to carry out the evident intent of the statute. See Garrigus v. Board of Commissioners, 39 Ind. 66, 70; Moynahan v. City of New York, 205 N. Y. 181, 186. Here there is not only nothing in the context or in the subject matter to réquire the construction contended for, but other provisions of the national banking laws are persuasively to the contrary. By § 5138, Rev. Stats., the minimum amount of capital is fixed in proportion to the population of the place-where the bank is located. If it had been intended to allow the establishment by an association of not one bank only but, in addition, as .many, branch banks as it saw fit, it is remarkable, to say the least, that there should have been no provision for adjusting the capital to the latter contingency or for determining how or under what circumstances such branch banks might be established or for regulating them. Section 5155, Rev. Stats., provides that it shall be lawful for a stat bank “having branches, the capital being joint and as- ' signed to and used by the mother-bank and branchés in definite proportions, to become a national banking association . . . and to retain and keep in operation its branches . . . the amount of the circulation . . . to be regulated by the amount of capital assigned to and used by each.” This provision, confined by its terms, as it is, to existing state institutions, may be fairly considered as constituting an exception to the general rule, and the presence of safeguarding limitations in the excepted case, with their entire absence from the statute otherwise, goes far in the direction of confirming the conclusion that the general rule does not contemplate, the establishment of branch banks. This apparently was the interpretation of Congress itself, since in two instances at least special legislation was deemed necessary to allow the establishment of branch banks, viz: at the Chicago Exposition, in 1892, c. 71, 27 Stat. 33, and at the St. Louis Exposition, in 1901, c. 864, 31 Stat. 1444, § 21, the existence of the branch bank in each instance being expressly limited to the period of two years.

The construction of the executive officers charged with the administration of the law has been, with substantial uniformity, to the same effect, apd in this view the Department of Justice, in a well considered opinion, rendered May 11,1911-, concurred. Lowry National Bank — Establishment of Branches. 29 Ops. Atty. Gen. 81.¹

This interpretation of the statute by the legislative department and by the executive officers of the government would go far to remove doubt as to its meaning if any existed. See Tiger v. Western Investment Co., 221 U. S. ; United States v. Hermanos y Compañia, 209 U. S. 337, 339.

But is is said that the establishment of a branch bank is the exercise of an incidental power conferred by § 5136, Rev. Stats., by which national banicing associations are vested with “ all such incidental powers as shall be necessary to carry on the business of banking.” The mere multiplication of places where the powers of a bank may be exercised is not, in our opinion, a necessary incident of • a banking business, within the meaning of this provision. Moreover, the reasons adduced against the existence of the power substantively are conclusive against its existence incidentally; for it is wholly illogical to say that a power which by fair construction of the statutes is found to be denied, nevertheless exists as an incidental power. Certainly an incidental power can avail neither to create powers which, expressly or by reasonable implication, are withheld nor to enlarge powers given; but only to carry into effect those which are granted.

Clearly, the state statute, by prohibiting branches, does not frustrate the purpose for which the bank was created or interfere with the discharge, of its duties to the government or impair-its efficiency as a federal agency; This conclusion would seem to be self evident, but if warrant for it be needed, it sufficiently lies in the fact that national banking associations have gone on for more than half a century without branches and upon the theory of an absence of authority to establish them. If the non-existence of such branches or the absence of power to create them has operated or is calculated to operate to the detriment of the government, or in such manner as to interfere with the ' efficiency of such associations as federal agencies, or to frustrate their purposes, it is inconceivable that the fact would not long since have been discovered and steps taken by Congress to remedy the omission.

Second.- The state statute as applied to national banks is, therefor*, valid, and the corollary that it. is obligatory and enforceable necessarily results, unless some controlling reason forbids; and, since the sanction behind it is that of the State and not that of the National Government, the power of enforcement must rest with the former and not with the latter. To demonstrate the binding quality'of a statute but deny the power of-enforcement involves a fallacy made apparent by the mere statement of the proposition, for such power is essentially' inherent in the very conception of law. It is insisted with great earnestness that the United States alone may inquire by quo warranto whether a national bank is acting in excess of its charter powers, and that the State is wholly without authority to do- so. This contention will be conceded since it is plainly correct, but the attempt to apply it here proceeds upon a complete- misconception of what the-State • is seeking -to do, a misconception which arises from confounding the relief -sought with the circumstances relied úpon to justify it. The State is neither seeking to enforce a law of the United States nor endeavoring to call the bank to account for an act in excess of its charter powers. What the State is seeking to do is to vindicate and enforce its own law, and the ultimate inquiry which it propounds is whether the bank is violating that law, not whether it is complying with the charter or law of its creation. The latter inquiry is preliminary and collateral, made only for the purpose of determining whether the state law is free to act in the premises or whether its operation is precluded in the particular casé by paramount law. Having determined that the power sought to be exercised by the bank finds no justification in any law or authority of the United States, the way is open for the enforcement of the state statute. In other words, the national statutes are interrogated for the sole purpose of ascertaining whether anything they contain constitutes an impediment to the enforcement of the state statute, and the answer being in the negative, they may be laid aside as ¡.of no further concern.

The application of the state statute to the present case and the power of the State to enforce it being established, the nature of the remedy to be employed is a question for state determination; and the judgment of the state court that the one here employed was appropriate is conclusive unless it involves a denial of due process of law, which plainly it does not. We are riot concerned with the question whether an information in the nature of quo war-ranto, according to the general principles of the law, is in fact appropriate. It is enough that the Supreme Court of the State has so held. Standard Oil Co. v. Missouri, 224 U. S. 270, 287; Twining v. New Jersey, 211 U. S. 78, 110-111. In Iowa Central Ry. Co. v. Iowa, 160 U. S. 389, 393, this Court said: “■ But it is clear that the Fourteenth Amendment in no way undertakes to control the power of a State to determine by what process legal rights may be asserted or legal obligations be enforced, provided the method of procedure adopted for these purposes gives reasonable notice and affords fair opportunity to.be heard before the issues are decided. This being the case, it was . obviously not a right, privilege, or immunity of a citizen of the United States to have a controyersy in 'the state court prosecuted or determined by one form of action instead of by another. . . . Whether the court of last resort of the State of Iowa properly construed its own constitution and laws in determining that the summary process under those laws was applicable to the matter which it adjudged, was purely the decision of a question of state law, binding upon this court.” See also Louisville & Nashville R. R. Co. v. Schmidt, 177 U. S. 230, 236; Hooker v. Los Angeles, 188 U. S. 314, 318; Rogers v. Peck, 199 U. S. 425, 435.

The judgment of the Supreme Court of Missouri is therefore

Affirmed-''

1 Our attention is directed to a later opinion of the Attorney General, dated October 3, 1923, which, although in terms affirniing the earlier opinion, announces a limited rule which does not seem to be in precise agreement with it. To the extent of the disagreement, however, we accent the view of the earlier opinion.