22 Kan. 89 | Kan. | 1879
The opinion of the court was delivered by
Plaintiffs in error (plaintiffs below) commenced an action of replevin to recover the possession of •certain cattle. Judgment was rendered against them in the •district court for the value of the cattle, and they prosecute ■this proceeding in error to review such judgment.
*93 “Union Stock Yards, Chicago, Nov. 4, 1871.
“Know all men by these presents, That I have this day bargained, sold and delivered to Denny & Bedman, of the Union stock yards, Cook county, Ill., three hundred and seventy-five (375) Texas cattle that are now feeding on my farm in Bichardson county, Nebraska. Cattle are all branded with the letter ‘B.’ O. P. Faulkner.”
This instrument, though in form an absolute bill of sale, was found by the jury to have been intended as only a security. It appears that Faulkner received some money thereon from Denny & Bedman, and shipped some cattle to them. The balance remained in his possession, at his farm in Nebraska, until his death, in May, 1872, and are the cattle in controversy. No filing or record was made of this bill of sale in Illinois, Nebraska or Kansas. May 31, 1872, O. P. Faulkner died, and on June 10th, Hedwig Faulkner, his widow, was appointed administratrix by the probate court of Bichardson county, Nebraska. During the lifetime of O. P. Faulkner, two suits were commenced against him, and a portion of these cattle taken under attachments therein by the sheriff of Bichardson county. June 17th, 1872, this action was commenced, in Brown county, Kansas. The cattle were then in Kansas, being in charge of herders employed by Faulkner in his lifetime, and continuing in the employ of the administratrix after his death. They were feeding on the range in day-time, and herded at night at the farm of one Floyd Crandall, in Brown county. The possession of the herders was the possession of the administratrix, except so far as divested by the levy under the attachment. It would seem probable, though the facts are not explicitly found, that at the time of the seizure under the attachments, the death of O. P. Faulkner, and the appointment of his administratrix, the cattle were on the Kansas side of the state line: in other words, the court proceedings were in Nebraska, and the property probably in Kansas. We say probably; for as the cattle were kept very near to the state line, they may in feeding have ranged on both sides of the line, and actually have been in Nebraska at the time of the levy and the appoint
It may not follow that her possession was tortious, but whatever rights she possessed would spring from comity and the laws of this state, and not from the powers given her by the courts of Nebraska. Wherever a decedent leaves property in two states, it is common to have administration in each state — the principal in the state of his domicil, and an ancillary in the other. And a state always has the right to protect home creditors by administration of the decedent’s property within its borders. So that if administration had been taken out in Brown county, Kansas, the administrator so appointed would have had the right to the possession of the cattle in that county, as against the administratrix appointed in Nebraska. In Story on the Conflict of Laws, § 512, it is said:
“In regard to the title of executors and administrators, derived from a grant of administration in the country of the domicil of the deceased, it is to be considered that that title cannot de jure extend as a matter of right beyond the terri
It becomes important, therefore, in determining whether creditors have acquired any valid liens which they may assert as against the bill of sale, to know whether the levy under the attachment was actually made in Nebraska or Kansas. If the former, the sheriff’s title must be recognized; if the latter, it is of no validity.
We forbear further remarks upon this case, but because the case was not decided in accordance with the views herein expressed, direct a reversal of the judgment, and a new trial.