169 N.Y. 506 | NY | 1902
The plaintiff and the defendant are foreign corporations, organized under the laws of the State of Illinois, and the action is brought upon a judgment; which is alleged in the complaint to have been recovered against the defendant in a court of general jurisdiction, within that state. The cause of action, however, upon which the judgment was rendered, is not set forth. The defendant demurred to the complaint; specifying, as grounds, a want of jurisdiction in the court, as to the person of the defendant and as to the subject-matter, and that the complaint did not state facts sufficient to constitute *509 a cause of action. The demurrer has been sustained below and the complaint was dismissed.
Upon the appeal, which the plaintiff now takes to this court from the judgment of dismissal, we have presented questions of the construction which is to be given to the provisions of section 1780 of our Code of Civil Procedure and of how far its provisions are affected, or controlled, by section I of article IV of the Constitution of the United States.
Section 1780 provides that, "an action against a foreign corporation may be maintained by another foreign corporation, * * * in one of the following cases only: * * * 3. Where the cause of action arose within the state."
The demurrer admits the recovery of a valid judgment and I shall assume that it was upon a cause of action generally valid. The questions are both interesting and important; but I think that the legal principles, which should guide the decision, are well settled.
The appellant's contention, in effect, is that the cause of action set forth in the complaint arose within this state; because an action on a foreign judgment is an action on a contract, which is to be performed in this state, as everywhere within the United States, where the judgment debtor is called upon to pay it. It is somewhat difficult to appreciate the force of the reasoning, which resolves a judgment, that has been rendered between the parties within a foreign jurisdiction, into a cause of action that "arose within the State." Doubtless, a judgment, as a debt of record, is a contract obligation of the highest nature. The cause of action has become merged and the law implies the obligation and the promise of the defendant to pay; but it is not a contract in the sense of any engagement of the parties with each other. The element of mutuality is wanting; forjudicium redditur in invitum. (Bidleson v. Whytel, 3 Burrows, 1545; McCoun v. N.Y.C. H.R.R.R. Co.,
As to the power of the state to prescribe, arbitrarily, or from policy, limitations and conditions upon the exercise by foreign corporations of corporate rights, I suppose there to be no doubt; whether they be upon the right to do business here, or upon the right to sue in our courts. (People v. Fire Association ofPhila.,
It is strenuously insisted, however, that the action is maintainable, within the meaning and the operation of section 1 of article IV of the Constitution of the United States; which reads that "full faith and credit shall be given in each state to the public acts, records and judicial proceedings of every other state; and the Congress may, by general laws, prescribe the manner in which such acts, records and proceedings shall be proved, and the effect thereof." A general view of the constitutional provision would make its purpose appear to be to introduce uniformity in the rules of proof; to prescribe the effect of such proof or authentication, and to attribute to foreign judgments "positive and absolute verity, so that they cannot be contradicted or the truth of them denied, any more than in the state where they originated." (Story on the Constitution, secs. 1310, 1312.) The effect, which the appellant would have the courts give to these provisions, is to invest the foreign judgment with such ubiquitous character and force, as, upon its being brought within the state, to make it mandatory upon its courts to entertain an action for its enforcement. That this is the true construction of the clause I doubt and my doubt appears to be supported by authority. I refer to what was said about the "full faith and credit" clause of the Federal Constitution inWisconsin v. Pelican Ins. Co. (
From a consideration of the authorities, the conclusion must result that the limitation imposed by section 1780 of the Code, upon the jurisdiction of the courts, in the respect discussed, was a valid exercise of the power of the state and that, when the cause of action is the enforcement of a judgment rendered in a foreign jurisdiction, it is not one which, in the contemplation of the statute, arose within the state. Nor can it be said to be an unreasonable exercise of power, for the state to restrict litigation in its courts to causes of local origin, where a foreign corporation is sued by a foreign corporation. (Robinson
v. Oceanic Steam Nav. Co.,
The conclusion is reached without considering an aspect of the question, which is not, possibly; without importance and that *514
is that it does not appear from the complaint that the cause of action, upon which the plaintiff recovered its judgment, was one which it might constitutionally sue upon here. (Huntington v.Attrill,
The judgment should be affirmed, with costs.
PARKER, Ch. J., O'BRIEN, BARTLETT, HAIGHT, CULLEN and WERNER, JJ., concur.
Judgment affirmed.