72 Neb. 489 | Neb. | 1904
The principal questions involved in this case are identical with those stated and discussed in Chicago, B. & Q. R. Co. v. Richardson County, ante, p. 482, which follows and approves Chicago, B. & Q. R. Co. v. Richardson County, 61 Neb. 519, and also in State v. Back, ante, p. 402.
There is another question presented in this case which has been thoroughly discussed in the briefs and -in the oral argument upon the rehearing. The bridge in question in this case was assessed by the local officers for taxation for the years 1881 to 1885, inclusive, and in the year 1886 the railroad company, having paid those taxes under protest, brought an action in the district court for Cass county to recover the amounts so paid. Afterwards that action was brought to this court, and was determined against the company. Cass County v. Chicago, B. & Q. R. Co., 25 Neb. 348. It is contended that by the judgment in that case the questions involved in the case at bar are res judicata. The local authorities assessed this bridge, for taxation for the year 1901, and the company brought this action to restrain the collection of the taxes. The district court enjoined the collection of the taxes as prayed, and the case was brought to this court by appeal. The subject matter of the former litigation was the taxes
The real question in dispute between the parties is whether in the former action the rights of the parties and questions of fact, then in dispute between them, have, by that case, been adjudicated so as to estop the parties to that litigation from now questioning the facts so determined. It was said by this court in State v. Broatch, 68 Neb. 687:
“A judgment, rendered by a court of competent jurisdiction, determining the rights of the litigants on a cause of action or defense, is an effectual bar against future litigation over the same right determined by such judgment, and is for all time, unless reversed or modified, binding on the parties and their privies in estate or in law. A ‘right, question or fact’ distinctly put in issue and directly determined by a court of competent jurisdiction as a ground of recovery, cannot be disputed in a subsequent suit between the same parties or their privies, and this even though the second suit is for a different cause of action.”
Of course, the propositions of law that were advanced by the court as requiring the disposition made of the issues in the former case, if afterwards found to be erroneous, . would not be binding upon the court in subsequent litigation between the parties involving a different cause of ' action. State v. Savage, supra; State v. Broatch, supra.
Many authorities are cited and ably discussed in the respective briefs of counsel. Our labors have been much lightened by those discussions and by the oral arguments at the bar. There is substantially no difference of opinion upon the controlling legal principle involved. Specific facts that are so involved in a litigation that the result of
In the brief for the county in the case at bar it is said: “The real controversy between the railway company and the county of Cass is the right of the local officers to assess, and tax the west half of the bridge across the Missouri river near Plattsmouth, in said county,” and again, “We now ask this court to say whether in the district court in said cause the issue of fact as well as of law was not raised, litigated and determined.”
It is insisted that after the former case had been brought
Although a claim for taxes under the assessment for one year is not adjudicated by a prior adjudication of the validity of a tax upon the same property under assessment for a different year, still, if the liability to taxation depends upon a charter right of exemption, the adjudication of that charter right in one litigation will estop the parties thereto to question that exemption in subsequent litigation. This was distinctly held in New Orleans v. Citizens Bank, 167 U. S. 371, 17 Sup. Ct. Rep. 905. This is a case much relied upon by the appellant in the case at bar. The thing in litigation upon which the right to collect the tax in that case depended was the contractual exemption of the bank under its charter, and, it having been determined in the prior litigation that such "contractual relations existed, it was held that the parties were estopped to deny it in subsequent litigation. The adjudication of a contract right is an adjudication of fact, and a judgment that necessarily involves the question of the existence of a charter or contract right will be binding upon the same parties in future litigation involving the existence of that right. The existence of such contract right was held to be the thing adjudicated in the former litigation. The court said:
“The estoppel resulting from the thing adjudged does not depend upon whether there is the same demand in both cases, but exists, even although there be different demands, when the question upon which the recovery of the second demand depends has under identical circumstances and conditions been previously concluded by a judgment between the parties or their privies.” Some of the leading-cases are then reviewed to illustrate this rule and the court said further: “In Tioga R. Co. v. Blossburg & C. R. Co., 20 Wall. 137, and Mason Limber Co. v. Buchtel, 101 U. S. 638, it was held that when the proper construction of a contract* was in controversy, the construction adjudged by the court would bind the parties in all future disputes.”
In Chicago, B. & Q. R. Co. v. Richardson County, 61 Neb. 519, it is made-plain that the court was construing the - statute and merely applying its provisions to conceded facts. The court said:
“It is conceded by defendants that the bridge over the Missouri river at Rulo, on the west half of which the taxes in dispute were levied, is owned and used by plaintiff as a part of its continuous line of track,” and after quoting at large sections 39 and 40 of the statute, it was further said: “It needs no argument to show that the railroad bridge at Rulo is neither a machine shop, a general office building or a storehouse; and if this bridge, within the meaning of the statute, is neither real nor personal property outside the right of way of plaintiff, it is not to be assessed by the local assessor, but is taxable only by the state board of equalization. There is no claim that it is exempt from taxation, the only controversy being as to the jurisdiction of the taxing powers. If it is inside, i. e., a part of, the right of way, as the term is employed in the act, then it must be assessed by the state board, otherwise not. The meaning of the term Tight of way/ as employed by the statute, is important, indeed, decisive of the question.”
This fact is made the basis of the decision. Manifestly all other matters discussed in the opinion are legal questions and relate to the construction of sections 89 and 40 of the revenue law (Compiled Statutes, 1901, ch. 77). Clearly this does not make the determination of the question depend upon any disputed fact. It is held that the fact which is here recited, “if the bridge is inside the right of way as the term is employed in the act,”- then it must be assessed by the state hoard. It is in that case, and in the two later cases above referred to, determined as matter
The judgment of the district court is
Affirmed.