31 Tex. 207 | Tex. | 1868
Lead Opinion
—Kennedy brought suit in the district court of Bastrop county against Morrison, founded upon two promissory notes executed by Morrison to Kennedy or order, and upon an account for personal services, and another account for the use -and hire of two servants. Suit was brought by attachment, which was levied, and property released on special bail. There was no personal service of the petition on defendant. On the trial the defendant moved that the attachment be quashed, because the affidavit was not made according to the requirements of the statute. The petition states the indebtedness of the defendant with sufficient certainty, giving a full statement of the causes and foundation of such indebtedness, as well as the non-payment of the same. The affidavit is that the
In the case of Marshall v. Alley, 25 Tex., 342, the plaintiff in his affidavit stated that the defendant was “justly indebted” to him in a certain sum, but in the further statement of his cause, showing the grounds of the indebtedness, it appeared that there was really a less sum due than the said amount, and the affidavit was deemed insufficient.
In the case of Morgan v. Johnson, 15 Tex., 568, Justice Wheeler says : “It is objected to the judgment that the affidavit to obtain the attachment was insufficient, because it does not state the amount of the indebtedness. It, however, does state that the defendant is indebted to the plaintiff in the several sums of money mentioned in the petition, and this we think was sufficient. We are not aware that it has ever been held to be necessary to state the sum in the affidavit, where the sum demanded is thus expressly and definitely stated in the petition and the party makes oath that that sum is due.”
Taking these two decisions, and giving them their proper construction, the inference is that the pleadings of the plaintiff in attachment, filed under oath, must show conclusively to the court a certain amount justly due. And
In the case of Livengood v. Shaw, 10 Mo., 274, the court, upon a similar case to the one at bar, said: “The affidavit alleges that the defendant is indebted, &c., omitting the word ‘justly,’ as prefixed in the statute to the word ‘indebted.’ * * * According to the common legal acceptation of the term indebted, it means justly indebted, legally indebted, indebted according to law, and the superadding of the term justly does not therefore qualify or restrict the word ‘indebted.’”
Another exception of the defendant is, that the stamp was placed on the attachment instead of the petition. The papers show that the petition, affidavit, and attachmejnt were all filed and issued at the same time.
The statute of 1862 provides as a stamp duty for every “writ or other original process by which any suit is commenced in any court of record, either law or equity, fifty cents.” It is assumed by the act that a suit is commenced by a “writ or other original process,” and it is believed that this is the case in most of the states. In this state the act of 18th May, 1846, says, “all civil suits in the district court shall be commenced by petition filed in the office of the clerk of the district court.” [Paschal’s Dig., Art. 1426.] The petition is entirely different from a writ or other process, as said process is obtained by filing the petition. The same statute provides what the style of writs shall be, and the article closes by stating that the clerk issuing any process shall mark thereon the day on which it issued. [Paschal’s Dig. Art. 1431, Note 543.] It would therefore be
The defendant also objects to this court taking any jurisdiction of this case, because the plaintiff has not appealed from a final, but, as he says, an interlocutory judgment. If there is any one point decided and re-decided by this court, it is that no appeal will lie from an interlocutory judgment. If a party were allowed to appeal from any and every interlocutory judgment during the pendency of a suit, and thus suspend the progress of the same during the pendency of the appeal, it would be an easy matter for a party unwilling to have a suit tried to have the same postponed indefinitely. But we must not confound an interlocutory with a final judgment. The definition of an interlocutory judgment is readily suggested by reverting to the original signification of the word, that it is a judgment between something; and, as it not unfrequently happens
Upon the levy of the attachment the defendant had the option of the two courses to have his property released therefrom. Article 150, Paschal’s Digest, provides, in substance, that the defendant shall have the right to replevy the property by giving bond with sureties for the amount of the debt or the value of the property, as he may choose, conditioned that he return the specific property in case he be
This court therefore, proceeding to render such a judgment as the district court should have rendered, because it seems to this court that the district court erred in not rendering judgment against said W. G-. Kennedy and his sureties on the bail bond, viz, J. D. Hash and A. "W. Moore, it is ordered that said judgment be set aside and reversed, and the judgment be entered against said Kennedy, Hash, and Moore.
Ordered accordingly.
Dissenting Opinion
dissenting. — In this ease I must dissent from the opinion of the court delivered by the chief justice.
To give clearly and intelligibly the view which I entertain of the law applicable to the case, it becomes necessary to present a full statement of the facts as they appear in the pleadings and proceedings in the cause.
To the spring term of the district court, 1866, for Bastrop
The petition of the plaintiff, filed in the clerk’s office October 11,1865, states that “ the plaintiff, of the county of Bastrop, in the State of Texas, complains of O. II. Morrison, of said county,” and then proceeds to set forth the cause of action and the ground for the attachments This is the only allegation in the original petition of residence of either plaintiff or defendant. The petition was sworn to on the day of its filing, and there was no separate affidavit for the obtension [obtaining?] of the writ of attachment. This, too, is the only averment in the petition to show that the court had the right to acquire jurisdiction over the person or the property of the defendant by issuing its appropriate process to establish its judicial authority over the cause of action.
■ The bond was executed by the plaintiff in conformity with the requirements of the statute, and citation and the writ of attachment were issued by the clerk, as the law
“ Came to hand October 12, 1865, and executed October 13, 1865, by leaving a certified copy of this citation, with a certified copy of plaintiff’s petition, at the house of 0. IT. Morrison. Returned October 23, 1865.
James B. Cope,
“ Sheriff Bastrop county.”
A mode of service unknown to our statutes or practice. The attachment was levied upon certain property, in regard to which the sheriff made the following return:
“ Came to hand October 12, 1865, and executed October 18, 1865, by levying upon the following property of C. H. Morrison, in the presence of Thomas J. Hill, viz: twenty bales of cotton, twenty head of mules, and four wagons. Returned October 19,1865. James B. Cope,
“ Sheriff of Bastrop county.”
9n the 21st of July, 1866, nine months after the levy of the attachment, the defendant, C. H. Morrison, with Thomas J. Hill and William Coats as his sureties, executed and delivered to the sheriff what is called a special bail bond for double the amount of the debt and demand sued for, which bond was approved by the sheriff, and returned and filed in the office on the said 21st day of July, 1866, the bond being for the sum of $11,064 22, while the debt or demand was only $5,532 11.
On the 13th of December, 1868, the. attorneys for the defendant, Morrison, entered and filed a motion to quash the attachment in the case, with a protestando against the jurisdiction of the court, and on the same day entered and filed another motion to quash the special bail bond, with a like protest against the jurisdiction over the cause of action. The reasons assigned for the first motion were insufficiency of the petition, the want of a revenue stamp upon it as the initial proceeding, defectiveness and.
It further appears in the proceedings, by bill of exceptions taken by defendant, that after the attachment and bail bond were quashed objection was taken by defendant’s attorneys to the want of service of process upon the defendant and the want of power in the court to try until such service was had. Furthermore, that after the special exceptions to the plaintiff’s petition were sustained by the court, and the parties had announced themselves as ready for trial on the plea to the jurisdiction, and the defendant had had a witness sword, and commenced his examination, the plaintiff asked leave to file a demurrer to the plea to the jurisdiction, which leave, though objected to by defendant’s attorneys, was granted, the demurrer filed, and sustained by the court.
The object of the plaintiff’s motion to reform the judgment was to have the judgment rendered as well against the sureties, in the bail bond as against the defendant in the action.
Such, in brief, are the prominent and important parts of the pleadings and proceedings in the court below, and which are the only matters necessary, in my judgment, for a full and intelligible comprehension of the principles of law applicable to the case. I have been thus comparatively minute in their presentation, that there may be no misap
The attachment laws of this country are emphatically the creations of the statutes of the several states. They have no foundation in general customs, which are the usual sources of the remedies for injuries to person and property. Originating, as we are told, in the particular customs of a
Of these four classes of debtors, subject to the attachment law, it could never be in the contemplation of the law-giver that the first class were, or ever could be, while they were non-resident, liable to personal service, and could thus be drawn within and made subject to the jurisdiction of its courts. Such a conception would violate a fundamental principle of our political system. It would be an attempt to make the laws of a state operate extra-territorially, and be in direct contravention of a well-known and universally-acknowledged principle of our civil jurispru
The vital point in this case, as developed by the pleadings and proceedings in the court below, is the question of jurisdiction of the court, and its legal authority to render a personal judgment against a non-resident debtor, which would, by any comity of nations or states, be regarded by the tribunals of other countries as binding on the party. It is a grave question, and has not been directly adjudicated in this state, nor, so far as I know, has it even been determined in any of the other states of the Union. In this particular case, if the court had jurisdiction of the person, then the judgment might not be invalid, though it might* be voidable, and subject to correction by motion in the court below, or to reversal in this court, for an irregular or wrongful exercise of the power of the court. But if the court had neither acquired nor could acquire jurisdiction over the person of a resident citizen in another nation or state, then this personal judgment is absolutely void.
This involves an inquiry into the nature and character of the jurisdiction of the common-law courts of our country, so far as the enforcement of civil rights is concerned. I take it there is a marked distinction between the civil and criminal jurisdiction of our courts. The latter is founded upon the essential principles of social justice and social security. It is the nature, the character, and the extent of civil jurisdiction which I purpose briefly to investigate, and which naturally arise out of the pleadings and proceedings in the cause now under consideration.
“The term jurisdiction', in its judicial sense, has a twofold signification. It is either local, which expresses the
It is the law alone which gives jurisdiction, whether local or potential. It cannot be conferred by any mere acts or consent of parties. The court upon which this potential jurisdiction is conferred by law must acquire its local jurisdiction by such process as is authorized bylaw. One of two things must exist, and is indispensable in the local jurisdiction to authorize the court to acquire this potential jurisdiction: either the person or the property of some defendant, the actual residence of the person, or what is called the forum domicilii, or the presence of property within the local jurisdiction, called the forum rei sitae. There is such a thing, too, as legislative'jurisdiction. Its power and authority, also, is confined within its territorial limits. Justice Story lays down the proposition, in his Conflict of Laws, that “Ho sovereignty can extend its process beyond its territorial limits, to subject either persons or property to its judicial decisions. Every exertion of authority of this sort beyond this limit is a mere nullity, and incapable of binding such persons or property in any other tribunal.” If no sovereignty can do this directly, surely it cannot accomplish it by any indirection, because it would be in fraud of a great international principle. To acquire jurisdiction over a person, (who is not a citizen of the state, but who may be temporarily within the local jurisdiction of the court,) the court must make him a party by its own process by service, and it cannot acquire it by any proceedings in invitum, nor can the legislature confer the power on the courts to do so, because the state has no claim upon the allegiance of such non-resident or foreigner.
Lord Ellenborough, in an opinion pronounced, in an
“By persons absent from the island, must necessarily be understood persons who have been present and within the jurisdiction, so as to have been subject to the process of the court; but it can never be applied to a person who, for aught that appears, never was within or subject to the jurisdiction. Supposing, however, that the act (of Tobago) had said in terms, that though a person sued in the island had never been present within the jurisdiction, yet that it should bind him upon proof of nailing up the summons on the court-house door; how could that be obligatory upon the subjects of other countries? Can the Island of Tobago pass a law to bind the rights of the whole world ? Would the world submit to such assumed jurisdiction? The law itself, however, fairly construed, does not warrant such an inference; for ‘ absent from the island ’ must be taken only to apply to persons who had been present there, and were subject to the jurisdiction of the court out of which the process issued; and, as nothing of that sort was in proof here to show that the defendant was subject to the jurisdiction at the time of commencing the suit, there was no foundation for raising an assumpsit in law upon the judg-. ment so obtained.”
And this doctrine, says Justice Story, has been fully recognized in the American courts. In this opinion it is clearly manifest that all legislative action conferring power npon the courts to render judgments against resident citizens of another state, without service of process, or an unforced answer to the merits of the suit, is rejected and repudiated by the most enlightened jurists of England and America.
Certainly the legislature of this state may enact any laws
Testing this case by the doctrine and principles already indicated, I cannot understand the reason, nor appreciate the legal logical deductions, which brought about the conclusion to sustain the plaintiff’s demurrer to the defendant’s plea to the jurisdiction. I am fully aware of the decision of this court, reported in 1 Tex., in which it was adjudged, that the allegations contained in an affidavit for attachment were not traversable. For the resident citizens in the local jurisdiction, over whom the potential jurisdiction for administrative justice always exists and is never in abeyance, this principle of law is, perhaps, properly announced by the distinguished jurist who delivered that opinion. Resident citizens are concluded by everything which may be done in conformity with the statute. And such was the character of the case of Cloud v. Smith, 1 Tex., 611, to which I have alluded. But the point now raised in the case under consideration is as to the power of the court over non-residents, or citizens of another state, derivable from onr statutes of attachment. This point has never been decided by this court, so far as I can discover, nor do I believe it has ever been adjudicated in any of the other states, because, no doubt, precisely such a state of pleading and disclosure by the proceedings has perhaps never occurred in the judicial
If it be true, as the demurrer admits, it would seem that both the plaintiff and defendant were residents of the State of Louisiana, for the nature of the alleged indebtedness and the considerations upon which it was founded, as shown by the original petition, indicate that, at the time the liability accrued, they were then in that state, and the presumption is that they so remained, unless that presumption is rebutted by some allegation in the pleading. The only allegation in the original petition rebutting that presumption is the statement that they were of the county of Bastrop, State of Texas. On this point, however, I suppose we are concluded by the decision in 7 Tex., which recog
The bail bond is not such a one as the statute prescribes. It is well settled by adjudications in nearly all the states that the attacking creditor, in a resort to this harsh and
With this view of the case, to my mind it is clear that the judgment of the court below, on the original cause of action, ought to be reversed. I am also satisfied, in my own mind, that the judgment was right in quashing the bail bond, because it was not such bond as the statute requires. I am further of opinion that the court erred in quashing the attachment solely upon the authority of the opinion in 7 Tex. Under that decision, of the sufficiency of such an allegation of residence, the plaintiff had a right to his attachment upon the ground stated in his petition and sworn to. The court, by its process, had got the property into the custody of the law, where it ought to have been kept until final judgment. And if the plaintiff was mistaken in the actual residence of the defendant, it was his misfortune, for which the law is not responsible. And if, by reason of such mistake, the property was suffered to slip or escape from the custody of the law, when the law did not require it to be thus let loose — as our laws are not