Low v. R. P. K. Pressed Metal Co.

99 A. 1, 91 Conn. 91, 1916 Conn. LEXIS 16
CourtSupreme Court of Connecticut
DecidedNovember 8, 1916
StatusPublished
Cited by23 cases

This text of 99 A. 1 (Low v. R. P. K. Pressed Metal Co.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Connecticut primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Low v. R. P. K. Pressed Metal Co., 99 A. 1, 91 Conn. 91, 1916 Conn. LEXIS 16 (Colo. 1916).

Opinion

Beach, J.

In the absence of statute, a corporation cannot be dissolved by judicial decree, except in an action commenced in the name of the State which created it. Hardon v. Newton, 14 Blatchf. (U. S.) 376, Fed. Cas. No. 6054; Elizabethtown Gas Light Co. v. Green, 46 N. J. Eq. 118, 18 Atl. 844; Pride v. Pride Lumber Co., 109 Me. 452, 458, 84 Atl. 989. Hence courts of equity have, in the absence of statutory authority, been unwilling to appoint receivers of corporations in liquidation proceedings at the instance of private suitors, lest they should by indirection accomplish all the practical consequences of a technical dissolution of the corporation. Pennsylvania Steel Co. v. New York City Ry. Co., 117 C. C. A. 503, 519, 198 Fed. Rep. 721, 737. As a result of this judicial caution, expressions may be found in some text-books and decisions questioning whether equity has any jurisdiction at all to appoint receivers over corporations for the purpose of administering the corporate assets, in actions commenced by private suitors, unless specially authorized by statute to wind up the business of the corporation and terminate its corporate existence. See Pennsylvania Steel Co. v. New York City By. Co., supra, where the development of the jurisdiction of equity to appoint receivers of corporations is outlined. These authorities do not lay down the broad generalization that equity has no inherent jurisdiction over the subject-matter. On the contrary, courts of equity frequently appoint receivers in liquidation over corporations without statutory authority. As pointed out by Judge Noyes in Pennsylvania Steel Co. v. New York City Ry. Co., supra, exceptions to the so-called rule have been evolved which are in some aspects as broad as the rule itself. The par *95 ticular exception to which he refers in that opinion is in the case of creditors’ bills. Another exception is in the case of foreclosures of corporate mortgages. Still another, which arises out of the necessities of the case, is in the appointment of receivers of the property of foreign corporations carrying on business within the forum. In the latter class of cases the local court is necessarily without authority, statutory or otherwise, to dissolve the corporation; and since the statutes of the forum in regard to corporate receiverships generally relate to domestic corporations only, courts of equity, in dealing with receiverships over foreign corporations, have in point of fact exercised their inherent powers as courts of chancery.

The plaintiff relies upon authorities holding that because the courts of one State cannot decree the dissolution of corporations created by another State, they will not entertain an original action in the nature of a stockholders’ suit to wind up the business of a foreign corporation. Republican Mountain Silver Mines v. Brown, 7 C. C. A. 412, 58 Fed. Rep. 644; Sidway v. Missouri Land & Live-Stock Co., 101 Fed. Rep. 481; Maguire v. Mortgage Co. of America, 122 C. C. A. 83, 203 Fed. Rep. 858. Here again may be found expressions tending to support the plaintiff’s claim that the courts of one State are absolutely without original jurisdiction to wind up the local business of a foreign corporation at the instance of stockholders; but the common practice of appointing so-called ancillary receivers in such cases demonstrates that courts do have jurisdiction over the subject-matter of winding up the local business of foreign corporations in receivership proceedings, whether in a stockholders’ suit or upon a creditors’ bill. It would be an intolerable proposition to assert that any local business was beyond the original equity jurisdiction of our courts merely because it was *96 conducted by a foreign corporation. The principle that courts will not interfere in what are vaguely called the internal affairs of a foreign corporation, must yield to the larger and more important principle that all who choose to engage in business within the State, whether under a corporate-franchise or-not, necessarily subject such business to the jurisdiction of the courts as fully as if it were conducted by our own citizens or corporations. a

It is, however, unnecessary to argue the point further, for the plaintiff himself, by applying to be appointed as ancillary receiver, admits that the Superior Court for Fairfigld County has power to appoint an ancillary receiver, of the local business of this New York corporation for the purpose of winding up the local business; and his contention that it has power to appoint an ancillary receiver but not an original receiver for that purpose, or in other words, that it had no jurisdiction to appoint any receiver at all for that purpose until the courts of New York had first appointed a general receiver in winding up proceedings at the domicil of the corporation, is manifestly inconsistent with the independent sovereignty of the State of Connecticut. It may be the better practice, as it is the usual practice, for the domiciliary receiver to be first appointed; but it is self-evident that the jurisdiction of a Connecticut court to wind up a Connecticut business in receivership proceedings must be derived wholly and exclusively from the State of Connecticut. The plaintiff seems to argue that it is derived in this case solely from the constitutional obligation to give full faith and credit to the judicial proceedings of the State of New York; but without conceding that the constitutional obligation would control the discretion of our courts and compel them to appoint ancillary receivers, it is apparent that neither the Federal Government nor the State of New *97 York can supply, in the smallest degree, the vital force which enables our Superior Court, as a court of general jurisdiction, to respond to and execute its constitutional duty toward the judicial proceedings of other States. That force emanates from the sovereignty which constituted the court; and so far as the'Federal Constitution requires our courts to take action in giving full faith and credit to the judicial proceedings of other States, it simply requires the State of Connecticut to exercise its own inherent powers in that behalf. In short, it is too plain for further discussion that all the powers of any court must be derived from the State which created it. Therefore, the admitted jurisdiction of our Superior Court to wind up the local business of foreign corporations in ancillary receivership proceedings is an exercise of powers derived exclusively from the State of Connecticut, and in the absence of statute it is an exercise of the inherent powers of the Superior Court as a court of general chancery jurisdiction.

For jurisdictional purposes there is, of course, no distinction to. be drawn between the power to appoint a so-called ancillary receiver and the power to appoint an original receiver. The relation between the courts of the domicil and the local courts, in respect to the appointment of ancillary receivers over foreign corporations, is very clearly and accurately stated by Judge Wallace, speaking for the Circuit Court of Appeals for this circuit, in Sands v. Greeley, 31 C. C. A. 424, 426, 88 Fed. Rep.

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Bluebook (online)
99 A. 1, 91 Conn. 91, 1916 Conn. LEXIS 16, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/low-v-r-p-k-pressed-metal-co-conn-1916.