82 N.J. Eq. 155 | New York Court of Chancery | 1913
The hill in this case is filed for the regulation of the affairs of the Northside'Christian Reformed Church of Passaic, upon the ground that there was a misappropriation of the property and temporalities of the church society, the same having been diverted by a faction of the church from the denomination known as the Christian Reformed Church in America. The bill is filed by five individuals who bring the suit not only on their own behalf, but on behalf of all members of the Northside Christian Reformed Church, who are similarly situated. • It alleges, in short, that there is a schism in the church, and that a faction represented by the defendants has seceded therefrom and joined the Reformed Church in America: that the seceders have obtained possession of the church property, and without the consent of the complainants and their adherents are attempting to carry the church property with them and place if under the control of the Reformed Church in America. They claim that this is being attempted not only against the substantive rules of law regulating affairs of religious societies, but that it has been done and is being done in an unlawful and irregular manner, and that the result is that the defendants committed a breach of their trust as trustees of the Northside congregation in despoiling it of its property. They seek a restoration of the property to the denomination to which it originally belonged, and to enjoin the defendants from intermeddling with it or its possession or use as one of the churches affiliated with the Christian Reformed Church oE America.
The facts so far as they relate to the view now taken of the case will fully appear hereafter.
There is an objection raised at the outset of the ease, namely, that the very point presented here was once litigated in the supreme court and decided in favor of the defendants, and hence is ■
It was said by Mr. Justice Field, in the case of Cromwell v. County of Sac, 94 U. S. 351, that there is a difference between the effect of a judgment as a bar or estoppel against the prosecution of a second action upon the same claim or demand, and its effect as an estoppel in another action between the same parties upon a different claim or cause of action; in the former case the judgment, if rendered upon the merits, constitutes an absolute bar to a subsequent action. It is a finality as to the claim or demand in controversy, concluding the parties and those in privity with them, not only as to every matter which was offered and received to sustain or defeat the claim or demand, but as to any other admissible matter which might have been offered for that purpose.
But where the second action between the same parties is upon a different claim or demand, the judgment in the prior action operates as an estoppel only as to those matters in issue or points controverted, upon the determination of which the finding or verdict was rendered. In all cases, therefore, where it is sought to apply the estoppel of a- judgment rendered upon one cause of action to matters arising upon a different cause of action, the inquiry must always be as to the point or question actually litigated and determined in the original action—not what might have been thus litigated and determined. Only upon such matters is the judgment conclusive in another action.
It is, therefore, quite apparent on either of tire grounds above stated that the rule which was entered in the supreme court, dismissing the rule to show cause, cannot be held to be such an adjudication upon the merits of the controversy as will preclude the examination into the matter in the present proceeding.
It must be conceded that primarily the title to the office of elder or deacon or trustee must be litigated at common law; but it is likewise true that there is a class of cases in which courts of equity have examined the title to an office, but these are cases where there was some paramount equity to which the question of official title or authority were merely .incidental. Such was tire case of Johnston v. Jones, 23 N. J. Eq. (8 C. E. Gr.) 216. There it is said by Chancellor Zabriskie that if the question of the legality of an election, or- whether a certain person holds such an office arises incidentally in the course of a suit of which equity has jurisdiction, that court will inquire into and decide it as it would any other question of law or fact that arises in the cause, but that decision would be only for the purpose of the suit, and that it did not settle the right to the office or vacate it if the party was in actual possession; and he cites Doremus v. Dutch Reformed Church and Den v. Bolton, supra.
The complainants admit the right of these individual defendants and of the other individual members of the congregation to secede from the Christian reformed church and to affiliate themselves with any body that they may choose. But can they take the church property with them and emancipate it from the control of regularly elected trustees who are adhering to the form of church government and church authority to which the congregation was subject at the time it acquired the property ?
It was held in Doremus v. The Ministers, Elders, &c., 3 N. J. Eq. (2 Gr. Ch.) 332, that “ministers, elders or deacons, lawfully elected and ordained, and thus inducted into office, though they afterwards secede, renounce the authority of the classis and gen
And it was held in the True Reformed Dutch Church of Paramus v. Iserman, 64 N. J. Law (35 Vr.) 506, that as between two opposing factions of a religious association, land acquired by the association before any schism arose will remain the property of that faction which abides by the doctrines, principles and rules of the church government which the united body professed when the land was acquired.
And it was held in the American Primitive Society v. Pilling, 24 N. J. Law (4 Zab.) 653, that a congregation or inferior ecclesiastical corporation which, by its organization, is connected with and subject to the superior jurisdiction of the church to which it belongs, cannot, by the act of the corporation, or a majority, secede from the denomination, declare themselves independent, and take their corporate property with them.
These cases would seem to determine that the action of the ■defendants and their adherents is void in so far as it attempts to subject the property in question to the control of the authorities of the Reformed Church in America, and that it was a breach of trust on the part of the defendants to assist in or connive at the transfer of the property in question from one ecclesiastical body to another without the consent and concurrence of all concerned, or without a proceeding whose validity and effect is beyond contention.
■ The proceeding by which this attempt was made strikes me as irregular and disorderly, to such an extent as to be voidable on the complaint of any one interested. The whole proceeding for the transfer of a portion of this congregation and the whole of its property to the reformed church in America took place between January 4th and January 9th, 1912. Some time prior to January 4th new deacons and elders had been elected. They were to be ordained to their respective offices on January 7th. On January 4th objeetiohs were made to these men or some of them and the consistory of the church determined to delay the ceremony. On Sunday, January 7th, the defendant .Bast announced at the close of the morning service that there would be
The congregation at this meeting decided upon three matters by a vote of forty-six in the affirmative, two in the negative, and one not voting, they were—first, to install the newly elected officers that evening; second, to sever the relationship of the Northside church with the Christian Reformed Church and the classis of Hudson; and third, to call the defendant Van Den Heuvel as pastor, and provide for installing him. On the following day (January 8th) notice of this action was sent to the Hudson classis by a communication purporting to be signed by the president and secretary of the consistory; and on the same day the defendants took proceedings for the calling of a meeting ■ for the evening of the next day (January 9th) ostensibly to ratify the illegal acts of January 7th. This meeting was not called in the usual manner, by the consistory, but was called by nine persons who claimed to be members of the congregation, and who so described themselves in the notice, which reads as follows:
“Passaic, N. J., January 8, 1912.
“■We, undersigned members of the Northside Qhxistian Keformed Church of Passaic, N. J., members in full communion, call a consistory meeting to be held Thursday, January 9, 1912, at eight o’clock, in the church building on the southwest corner of Myrtle avenue and Burgess Place, Passaic, N. J., with the intention to decide concerning the relation in the case of severing from classis of Hudson, and what further lawfully may be brought before the gathering.”
This notice was printed and was served some time during January 8th, partly by personal service, but mostly by leaving-copies at the residence of the members. The supreme court in its opinion declared that this meeting was a valid meeting. From that proposition I most respectfully dissent, and I do it with great reluctance and with great deference to the opinion of
I do not think that any valid action could be taken at a meeting so called and held. It is therefore clear that the action that was taken on January 7th to ordain the elders and deacons to sever the connection with the Hudson classis and to elect the Eev. Mr. Yan Den Heuvel as pastor of the church were irregular and could not be and were not ratified by the meeting held on January 9th. It may be doubted whether the action that was taken at the meeting January 9th had any effect whatever. The minutes state that the president explained to the meeting that it was called for the purpose of approving and ratifying the proceedings of the previous Sunday mentioned in the minutes, a much broader call than is contained in the notice of the meeting; the minutes were read and opportunity given for correction ; the names of all the persons who had voted in favor of the resolution, and also of the five who had later voted in favor, were read, and no adverse vote having been received, the president asked for a rising vote, “which disclosed that the minutes were accepted, approved and established by unanimous vote.”
It next appears that in accordance with the church rules the ■ matters in dispute were submitted to what is known in that denomination as a double consistory, composed of the consistory of the church in which the differences exist, and the consistory
The rules of law relating to freedom of action by independent churches and congregations are different from those rules which apply to congregations which are affiliated with and are subordinate to higher judicatories. Independent churches may do what they please with their property, provided legal action is taken to that end, but when a religious society becomes affiliated with other religious societies and they unite to construct and maintain for their mutual advantage higher judicatories to which they subject themselves, then the individual society or worshiping unit holds its property and temporalities under an obligation to continue the affiliation until it can be broken by mutual consent; and if secession is attempted by a faction, however large or however small, such faction will not be allowed to carry the church property with it, certainly not so long as there is a loyal body which is recognized by the superior judicatory. Such is the case here. This congregation is about evenly divided. The complainants and their adherents are recognized by the Hudson classis as the officers and members of the North-side church; they have kept up the congregation and church exercises without any break. The defendants and their adherents have attempted to secede, and are not recognized by the classis oE Hudson as having official relations with the higher judicatories of the Christian Reformed Church. The worshiping units of this denomination in a particular locality form á classis which has jurisdiction over the churches within its territory. The supreme body is a synod which has jurisdiction superior to that of the classis. This organization makes a compact and zealous body of Christian worshipers who have volnn-tarily bound themselves by the obligation that I have mentioned.
It is not contended that the individual' members may not
“In case of a schism in a church which is in connection with and a constituent part of an ecclesiastical organization, and which has a head invested by its constitution or recognized usage with other supervisory and supreme control over the constituent part to determine all questions producing- schisms and divisions between the members, and to recognize and decide what faction is in the right, it is a well-settled law of tibe civil courts that the title to the property is in that part of the congregation which is acting in harmony with its own law and the ecclesiastical laws, usages, customs and principles which were accepted among- them before the dispute began, are the standards for determining which party is in the right.” Schnorr’s Appeal, 67 Pa. St. 138; 5 Am. Rep. 415.
There remains to be considered but one question, and that is What is the status of the defendants ? They were at one time elected trustees of the Northside church, and it was by virtue of their office as such trustees that they were enabled to obtain and hold possession of the church property, but having voluntarily severed their connection with the Christian reformed church, and having become members of another denomination, have they not by their own act so far renounced their trusteeship as that they can no longer represent the church society in that capacity or any longer meddle with its property and affairs. In my opinion this is the position in which they stand. The whole proceeding looks to me like a highhanded and lawless attempt to appropriate this church building and property to the uses of a faction of the congregation, every one of which has lost his membership in the church and has become a member of a church of a different denomination. While it is incompetent for this court to oust a trustee from Iris office as trustee of a religious
I must therefore hold that the complainants constitute the trustees of the Northside church, and that they, and they alone, have authority over the church property, and that they and their adherents constitute the religious society known by the name of the Christian Reformed Church of Passaic, New Jersey.
The decree should be for the complainants and should adjudicate that the complainants are the sole trustees of the Northside church, and that they are entitled as such to the custody and possession of the church property. The defendants should be restrained from intermeddling with the property or from diverting it or attempting to divert it from 'the denomination known as the Christian Reformed Church of America, and from retaining possession of or holding the property and temporalities of the church. Whatever may be necessary to place the complainants in full possession of the church property should be included in the decree. There should likewise be an injunction against Van Den Heuvel restraining him from acting as pastor of the church or in any way ministering to the congregation as pastor.
This decree will carry costs against the defendants.