106 Ala. 180 | Ala. | 1894
— We are unable to see any constitutional objection whatever to the act providing for the holding of a circuit court at Bessemer in Jefferson county. The constitution does not provide where in the several counties-the circuit court shall be held nor inhibit the holding of such courts at more than one place therein, nor require that when such courts are held at two or more places in one county they shall at each and all
The circuit court sitting at Bessemer — all circuit courts in the State, indeed — had in a broad sense jurisdiction of the subject matters involved between IColslty and Levy, severally, on the one hand, and Triest & Co. on the other; or mother words the claims of ownership by these parties of personal property attached on process issued at the suit of Triest & Co. and returnable to the circuit court, and issue taken thereon, presented a subject matter within the competency of all circuit courts to hear and determine, upon acquiring jurisdiction of the persons of the plaintiffs in attachment and the claimants. — 12 Am. & Eng. Encyc. of Law, pp. 299,.et seq, ; 2 Brick. Dig. 161, § 52. And the circuit court sitting at Bessemer did acquire jurisdiction of the persons of said plaintiffs and claimants through the agreement which they entered into for the transfer of ’ the claim suits to the dockets of that court from'the dockets of the circuit court sitting at Birmingham. To the efficacy of such agreement and the validity of the judgments subsequently rendered at Bessemer in the claim suits, it was in nowise essential for the sureties on the claim bonds to have assented to such transfer.' They were not parties to the record or in any just sense to the cause in anyway. They hound themselves to see to it that, in the event the property claimed and delivered to their principals should be found subject to the plaintiff’s attachment by any court having in any legitimate way acquired jurisdiction of the controversies, it should be forthcoming for the satisfaction of the judgment in the attachment suit, or, that failing, to pay the assessed value of the property, not to exceed the penalties of their undertaking. In the absence of fraud on the part of their principals, or fraudulent collusion between the plaintiffs and claimants, or some further agreement between them whereby the sureties’ right to have the claims adjudged on the case presented by a competent tribunal was abridged or defeated — and there is no pretense here of fraud or collusion, nor of a further vitiating agreement — the judgment against the claimants is binding on the sureties and determinative
The fact that by agreement of the plaintiffs and claimants these two and one other claim suit were tried together, does not in itself afford the sureties any just ground of complaint. It does not appear that their rights were prejudiced by the adoption of that course ; such agreements under like circumstances are customary, and the competency of the claimants to enter into them in good faith cannot be doubted. — Jaffray v. Smith, ante. p. 112.
The'foregoing considerations, we believe, dispose of every pb'int arising on this appeal, except that made on the facts that the executions which issued against the complainant as surety on the claim bonds of Kolsky and Levy were irregular in form and for amounts exceeding the penalties of the bonds executed by the respective claimants as principals and complainant as surety. We need only say in this connection that the remedy of the surety on the facts alleged in the bill is plain, adequate and complete in the law court-out of which these executions issued, and, of consequence, that he has no standing in a court of equity to have proceedings under said executions enjoined.
The bill is without equity. The motions to dismiss the bill and to dissolve the injunction for the want of equity in the bill should have been granted. The decree denying these motions is reversed, and a decree will be here entered dissolving the injunction and dismissing the bill.
Reversed and rendered.