Kalb v. Feuerstein

177 F.2d 243, 1949 U.S. App. LEXIS 3572
CourtCourt of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit
DecidedOctober 21, 1949
DocketNo. 9837
StatusPublished

This text of 177 F.2d 243 (Kalb v. Feuerstein) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Kalb v. Feuerstein, 177 F.2d 243, 1949 U.S. App. LEXIS 3572 (7th Cir. 1949).

Opinion

FINNEGAN, Circuit Judge.

On February 3, 1949, an order was entered in the District Court of the United States for the Eastern District of Wisconsin which sustained the findings of a Conciliation Commissioner on application of the farmer debtor for an accounting with, and for damages claimed by him, from Henry Feuerstein and Helen Feuerstein, secured creditors. The court likewise confirmed the Commissioner’s order appointing Henry Jacobson as trustee with bond in .the sum of $12,000, and directing that unless the debtor within thirty days from the date of said order redeemed the farm property involved by paying $12,000 into the Court, the Trustee file a petition for the sale or other disposition of the property and for such other proceedings as may be had with reference thereto under the provisions of the Bankruptcy Act, 11 U.S.C.A. § 1 et seq. By this appeal, Ernest Newton Kalb seeks to reverse that order.

For more than sixteen' years this farm property has been the subject of litigation between appellant and appellees. A brief resumé of the various steps taken in this prolonged litigation should lend material aid to an understanding and proper disposition of the matters involved in this appeal.

On March 6, 1923, the appellant who was then a bachelor, executed his two promissory notes, aggregating in amount $6,000, payable in ten years with interest at 5% per annum payable annually, one note in the sum of $2100 being payable to Henry Feuerstein, and the other for $3900 payable to Helen Feuerstein. These notes were secured by a first mortgage on the farm in question.

Ten years later, on March 9, 1933, appellees brought proceedings to foreclose the mortgage in the 'Comity Court of Walworth County, Wisconsin. A decree of foreclosure and sale was entered on April 21, 1933. There was then due in addition to the principal of $6,000, interest in the sum of $1232.57, attorneys’ fees amounting to $280 and costs in the sum of $87.28. The record also shows that taxes on the farm were then delinquent in the sum of approximately $700. Wisconsin at that time had a moratorium statute of which the defendant availed himself, and the sale of the farm was deferred until October 25, 1934.

On October 2, 1934, twenty-three days before the moratorium period expired, appellant filed his first petition under the Frazier-Lemke Act, 11 U.S.C.A. § 203, sub. s, and on October 25, 1934 the District Court entered an order staying proceedings on the foreclosure action in the County Court of Walworth County, Wisconsin. No further proceeding, other than a meeting of creditors, appears to have been taken in the matter of this first application under the Frazier-Lemke Act.

On May 27, 1935, certain portions of that Act were held to be unconstitutional by the Supreme Court of the United States. Louisville Joint Stock Land Bank v. Radford, 295 U.S. 555, 55 S.Ct. 854, 79 L.Ed. 1593, 97 A.L.R. 1106. On June 27, 1935 the District Court for the Eastern District of Wisconsin, dismissed appellant’s first petition under the Act.

Congress, in order to obviate the constitutional objections amended the FrazierLemke Act on August 28, 1935. By the terms of the new enactment Sec. 203, sub. s, [245]*245subparagraph 5, Title 11, U.S.C.A., provided that the Act, as amended, should be held to apply to all existing cases then pending in any federal court as well as to future cases, and that all cases under said Act that had been dismissed should be promptly reinstated without any additional filing fee or charges. Consequently the Wisconsin District Court, on September 6, 1935, entered an order reinstating appellant’s first petition as of October 2, 1934, the date of original filing.

During the interim between June 27, 1935, when the first petition was dismissed, and September 6, 1935, when it was reinstated, the County Court of Walworth County, Wisconsin, ordered a sale under the decree of foreclosure theretofore entered therein, directing that it be held on July 20, 1935.

The sale was held on that day and the premises were conveyed by sheriff’s deed to Henry Feuerstein. At appellant’s request the confirmation was delayed until September 16, 1935, when an order confirming the sale was entered.

On March 12, 1936, a writ of assistance issued from the County Court of Walworth County and Henry Feuerstein was put in possession of the farm. On March 17, 1936, the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Wisconsin entered an order dismissing for the second time, appellant’s first petition for relief under the Frazier-Lemke Act.

Thereafter appellant instituted two actions in the courts of Wisconsin. The first action prayed that the sheriff’s deed to Henry Feuerstein be voided, and that appellant be restored to possession of his farm. The second action, in which the Wisconsin judge who granted the writ of assistance, the sheriff who executed it, and the appellees Henry Feuerstein and Helen Feuerstein were made parties defendant, sought damages for the loss of the use of the farm, for assault and for false imprisonment.

In both these cases the Wisconsin trial court decided in favor of the appellees and other defendants, and their ruling was affirmed by the Supreme Court of Wisconsin. 231 Wis. 185, 285 N.W. 431.

However, on appeal the Supreme Court of the United States held, in Kalb v. Feuerstein, 308 U.S. 433, 60 S.Ct. 343, 84 L.Ed. 370, that the mere filing of a petition under the Frazier-Lemke Act conferred exclusive jurisdiction on the Federal Court and deprived all courts of the jurisdiction to maintain and enforce foreclosure proceedings. On January 2, 1940, the judgments of the Wisconsin Supreme Court in both cases were reversed and the causes remanded for further proceedings. The Supreme Court of Wisconsin on May 7, 1940 reversed its former rulings and remanded both cases for further proceedings. 234 Wis. 507, 291 N.W. 840.

Thereafter the action in which the appellant sought to recover damages was tried in the Circuit Court, Walworth County, where a verdict was directed in favor of the appellees Henry and Helen Feuerstein. This action of the trial court was affirmed by the Supreme Court of Wisconsin on December 2, 1941. Kalb v. Luce, 239 Wis. 256, 1 N.W.2d 176.

In the meantime, on February 28, 1940, Ernest Newton Kalb, appellant, filed, in the District Court for the Eastern District of Wisconsin a petition which was superseded ¡by his amended petition of March 18, 1940, seeking the reinstatement of his petition of October 2, 1934, and for a rehearing on the order of dismissal entered March 7, 1936. The rehearing was refused and the reinstatement of the petition denied by the District Court. 32 F.Supp. 356. The order of the District Court was affirmed by this Court, 116 F.2d 775, and certiorari was denied, 313 U.S. 568, 61 S.Ct. 940, 85 L.Ed. 1526.

On May 28, 1941, appellant filed in the District Court for the Eastern District of Wisconsin, his second petition under the Frazier-Lemke Act. Substantially the same assets and liabilities as listed in his original petition were included in this second petition. Appellees claiming that the emergency owing to which the FrazierLemke Act had been passed, no longer existed, moved to strike the farm property [246]

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Related

Kalb v. Feuerstein
308 U.S. 433 (Supreme Court, 1940)
Louisville Joint Stock Land Bank v. Radford
295 U.S. 555 (Supreme Court, 1935)
Randall v. Home Loan & Investment Co.
12 N.W.2d 915 (Wisconsin Supreme Court, 1944)
Kalb v. Feuerstein
291 N.W. 840 (Wisconsin Supreme Court, 1940)
Kalb v. Luce
1 N.W.2d 176 (Wisconsin Supreme Court, 1941)
Kalb v. Feuerstein
116 F.2d 775 (Seventh Circuit, 1940)
Feuerstein v. Kalb
127 F.2d 509 (Seventh Circuit, 1942)
Worley v. Wahlquist
150 F.2d 1007 (Eighth Circuit, 1945)
Kalb v. Feuerstein
285 N.W. 431 (Wisconsin Supreme Court, 1939)
In re Kalb
32 F. Supp. 356 (E.D. Wisconsin, 1940)

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Bluebook (online)
177 F.2d 243, 1949 U.S. App. LEXIS 3572, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/kalb-v-feuerstein-ca7-1949.