Reed v. St. Louis & San Francisco Railroad

209 S.W. 892, 277 Mo. 79, 1919 Mo. LEXIS 8
CourtSupreme Court of Missouri
DecidedMarch 1, 1919
StatusPublished
Cited by7 cases

This text of 209 S.W. 892 (Reed v. St. Louis & San Francisco Railroad) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Missouri primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Reed v. St. Louis & San Francisco Railroad, 209 S.W. 892, 277 Mo. 79, 1919 Mo. LEXIS 8 (Mo. 1919).

Opinion

BLAIR, P. J.

This is a suit under a covenant in a deed executed by the father of respondents to the. assignors of appellant railway. The other appellants are receivers of the railway company, appointed by the Federal Court for the Eastern District of Missouri on May 27, 1913. This suit was begun November 1, 1913. The covenant mentioned provided, among other things, that passenger trains should be stopped at Reeds on signal and that a failure of the grantees “to perform their part of the agreement shall make void this deed and the land herein quitclaimed shall revert to its original owner.” The prayer of the petition is “for a judgment devesting said Railroad Company and said receivers of all right, title and interest in and to said premises, after giving them a reasonable length of time in which to comply with the terms of said instrument.” The court adjudged that respondents were entitled to have certain passenger trains stop on signal for passengers “and that if defendants continue to fail to stop their trains on signal, then all the right, title and interest which they have acquired in and to said strips of ground should be devested and vested in plaintiffs.”

The court further ordered' that since the road was’ in the hands of the receivers no execution should issue, hut a certified copy of the judgment should he filed with the appointing court and that “the enforcement of said judgment shall be in said court in which said receivership matters are pending.”

A statement of some of the proceedings prior to the trial is pertinent. December 10, 1913, the company and receivers filed separate answers. These were general denials. June 15, 1914, the receivers filed an amended answer. After the evidence was in an amended petition was filed with leave, and the receivers refiled their amended answer, and the company refiled its answer. The amended answer of the receivers consisted of (1) a general denial, (2) a plea that defendants had been in the “actual, open, visible, notorious posses[84]*84sion of the strip of ground . . . described in the petition, and claiming to he the owners of the same, for moré than ten years prior to the institution of plaintiffs’ suit. That during all of said time there has been on said strip of ground railroad tracks and a depot, and defendants have been engaged in operating thereon a railroad, and that said strip of ground forms an integral part of its right of way and line of railroad over which defendants operate their trains from St. Louis, Missouri, to and through Jasper County, Missouri, and on into the States of Kansas and Oklahoma. Wherefore, defendants pray that the court will adjudge the title of said strip of ground described in plaintiffs’ petition to be well vested in these defendants and for costs.” The third paragraph-sets up the ten-year Statute of Limitations as a defense.

On. the trial the defendants'objected to the introduction of any evidence on the ground that the petition failed to state a cause of action and that the petition “shows that the property of the railroad is in the hands of receivers, and the jurisdiction of the res of the property should be in the. court appointing the receivers; this court has no jurisdiction.”

Appellants raise two questions. First, that the Jasper Circuit Court had no jurisdiction, since the property was in the hands of receivers appointed by another court. Second, that the cause of action was barred by the ten-year Statute of Limitation.

I. The first contention is that the fact that the railroad property was in the hands of receivers appointed by another court deprived the courts of Jasper County of jurisdiction in this case.

(a) It is well settled that one court may not appoint a receiver and take from the custody of a receiver previously appointed by lawful order of another court the assets and estate in the latter’s hands as receiver. [State ex rel. v. Reynolds, 209 Mo. 161.] It was held also in State ex rel. v. Williams, 221 Mo. [85]*85227, and Hardware Company v. Building Company, 132 Mo. l. c. 452, that in case one court has taken jurisdiction of a particular subject-matter and rendered its decree and the right of appeal is open to the losing party, a second court has no jurisdiction to open up and cause to be relitigated the questions determined, by the decree rendered by the court which first took jurisdiction. The authorities generally are in accord with these decisions. It is apparent this case does not fall within either of these principles. The contention of appellants is, in substance, that no action or suit can be brought against receivers without leave of the court appointing them and that want of leave is jurisdictional.

Suing Receivers. (b) It is now well recognized that the great weight of authority sustains the view that, except in actions having the purpose to deprive receivers of possession of the receivership property, want of leave to Slie is n°f jurisdictional but that such action may be controlled by injunctive process or by proceedings as for contempt. [High on Receivers (4 Ed.), sec. 254a; Alderson on Receivers, sec. 525; Carter v. Rodewald, 108 Ill. 351; Railroad v. Smith, 19 Kan. l. c. 230, 231; Bank v. Risley, 19 N. Y. l. c. 376, 377; Kinney v. Crocker, 18 Wis. l. c. 77, 78; Blumenthal v. Brainerd, 38 Vt. 402; Lyman v. Railroad, 59 Vt. 167; Allen v. Railroad, 42 Iowa, l. c. 686, et seq.; Hirshfeld v. Kalischer, 81 Hun, 606; Shedd v. Seefeld, 230 Ill. l. c. 127; Leuthold v. Young, 32 Minn. 122; Flentham v. Steward, 45 Nebr, 640; Payson v. Jacobs, 38 Wash. 203; Burke v. Ellis, 105 Tenn. l. c. 705, 706.]

The rule of these cases is that in cases in which “there is no attempt to interfere with the actual possession of property which the receiver holds under the order of” the court which appointed him the jurisdiction of another court does.not depend upon leave to sue; that the jurisdiction of other courts is not ousted in such cases by the mere fact of the appointment of a receiver; that the appointing court may, in any proper [86]*86case, enjoin the suitor or proceed against him as for contempt, but that its jurisdiction of the receivership does not, of itself, deprive all other courts' of ah jurisdiction in every matter affecting the receiver and the property in his hands. In Railroad v. Smith, supra, Brewer, J., subsequently of the United States Supreme Court, held that though it be conceded a court appointing a receiver might draw to itself all controversies affecting the receivership property, it was not compelled to do so. It had the power to leave them to be determined by other courts of appropriate jurisdiction; that the “appointment does not, ipso facto, oust all other courts of their ordinary jurisdiction as to matters in which the receiver may be interested, or which affect the property placed in his hands; it simply secures to that court the power to control at its discretion all such controversies. It may assert its right to táke to itself all such controversies, or it may leave them for determination where the parties may bring them. The jurisdiction of other courts remains unchanged; but it may reach parties and compel them to proceed nowhere else than in its own forum.” The authorities and the cases therein cited show this rule is supported by the weight of authority in this country and is the rule in England.

In Barton v. Barbour, 104 U. S. 126

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
209 S.W. 892, 277 Mo. 79, 1919 Mo. LEXIS 8, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/reed-v-st-louis-san-francisco-railroad-mo-1919.