118 Ala. 477 | Ala. | 1897
The appellee, a resident of this State, and an employe of appellant, brought this action against appellant, the Louisville & Nashville Railroad Co., a corporation organized under the laws of the State of Kentucky, and doing business in that State and also in Alabama and Tennessee, to recover the amount of wages earned and due him for work and labor done here •for appellant. In defense of the action appellant set up the payment by it, previously to the commencement of this suit, of a judgment rendered against it in a justice’s court in the State of Tennessee in an attachment suit, founded on a debt due in Tennessee, wherein appellee was defendant, and appellant was summoned to answer as garnishee. Appellee was a resident of Alabama at the time of the commencement, and during the pendency, of said attachment suit, was not personally served with notice thereof, had no actual notice, and did not voluntarily appear, but service was had on him
The case presented is ruled, with respect to both questions, by the cases of L. & N. R. R. Co. v. Dooley, 78 Ala. 524, and A. G. S. R. R. Co. v. Chumley, 92 Ala. 317. In film former case it was held that a debt due by a foreign corporation to an employe in the State of its creation, although it was doing business in this State also, could not be subjected by a creditor in this State by attachment against the non-resident creditor and garnishment against the corporation. In the latter, we decided that the payment by a railroad corporation created by the laws of this State, but doing business also in Tennessee, of a judgment rendered against it in Tennessee under a garnishment issued on a judgment recovered in that State against an employe resident in this State, was no' defense to an action by the employe to recover the wages due hiin for work done in this State, in the absence of evidence showing that, by the statutes of Tennessee, the court had acquired jurisdiction of the debt sought to be reached and subjected. In both of the above cases, it -was expressly decided, that the situs of a debt for the purpose of garnishment is at the domicil of the creditor, and not that of the debtor. And this fact is the true foundation for the proposition, that a State has no jurisdiction over a debt due to a non-resident and payable without the State of suit, in the absence of personal service on the creditor -within the State, or his volum tary appearance in a proceeding, in which jurisdiction over it is sought to be exercised. If it be conceded that a debt due by a resident of, or a corporation doing business in, one State to a resident in another State, is not
The right of a State to inquire into the obligations of a non-resident, and its jurisdiction to attach his property to answer for such obligations, is founded solely on the fact that each State has exclusive control and jurisdiction over the property situated within its territorial limits, and the inquiry can be carried only to the extent necessary to control the disposition of such property. If there be no personal service on the defendant
Any attempt to reconcile the conflicting authorities on the question of the situs of a debt for the purpose of garnishment, would be vain, but analogy, as Avell as reason and justice to the creditor, vvould seem to fix it at the domicil of the creditor, and forbid its seizure, or any change in the ownership thereof, by the law or procedure of any other State. It is now well settled that a debt due by an insolvent to a non-resident is property Avithin the creditor’s State, .and that no law or decree of the debtor’s State discharging his debts can operate to discharge the debt due to the non-resident. — Brown v. Smart, 145 U. S. 454; Denny v. Bennett, 128 U. S.
We find no error in the judgment of the city court, and it must be affirmed.