Sioux City & D.M. Ry. Co. v. Chicago, M. & St. P. Ry. Co.

Decision Date01 January 1886
Citation27 F. 770
PartiesSIOUX CITY & D.M. RY. CO. v. CHICAGO, M. & ST. P. RY. CO. and others.
CourtU.S. District Court — Northern District of Iowa

Joy Wright & Hudson, for complainant.

R. J Chase, O. J. Taylor, and J. W. Cary, for defendants.

SHIRAS J.

The bill in this cause was originally filed in the district court of Woodbury county, Iowa, a writ of injunction being allowed upon the filing of the bill, restraining the defendants from proceeding with the condemnation of the right of way over certain realty in the bill described. The Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Railway Company filed its answer to the bill, and a petition for the removal of the cause into the federal court, accompanied with a proper bond. The state court refusing to grant an order of removal, the petitioner procured a transcript, and filed the same in this court, and thereupon filed a motion to dissolve the writ of injunction on the ground that the answer fully met and denied all the grounds relied upon in the bill as reasons for enjoining the condemnation proceedings. At the time set for the hearing of this motion the complainant filed objections to the jurisdiction of the court, and it therefore becomes necessary to determine whether the case is one that is removable to this court.

The record shows that the complainant is a corporation organized under the laws of Iowa; that the defendant, the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Railway Company, is a corporation organized under the laws of the state of Wisconsin, and the other defendants are the sheriff of Woodbury county, and the commissioners by him summoned to appraise the damages to be paid by the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Company for its right of way over the premises in the bill described, and that these individual defendants are citizens of Iowa. The allegations of complainant's bill show that the subject of controversy is the question of which company has the right to occupy the premises in question for the construction of its line of railway. In this question the sheriff and the commissioners have no personal interest. They stand wholly indifferent between the parties. No action by them in the cause can affect the rights of the railway companies. They are purely nominal parties, and their joinder cannot affect the question of jurisdiction and the right of removal. There is but one controversy in the cause, and that is, which company has the prior, and therefore better, right to the occupancy of the premises in dispute, for the purposes of constructing and operating its line of railway? The sole parties in interest in this controversy are the railway companies, and the other defendants having no interest therein, and no right of control over the litigation intended to settle this question, it must be held that these parties are nominal only, and their presence as parties can neither confer nor defeat jurisdiction in this court.

Thus, in Wood v. Davis, 18 How. 467, it is said:

'It has been repeatedly decided by this court that formal parties, or nominal parties, or parties without interest, united with the real parties to the litigation, cannot oust the federal courts of jurisdiction, if the citizenship or character of the real parties be such as to confer it.'

See, also, Browne v. Strode, 5 Cranch, 303; Wormley v. Wormley, 8 Wheat. 421; Township of Aroma v. Auditor, 9 Biss. 289; S.C. 2 F. 33; Foss v. First Nat. Bank, 1 McCrary, 474; S.C. 3 F. 185.

The allegations of the bill filed in this cause do not show that the sheriff and commissioners have any joint interest in the subject of the controversy with the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Railway Company; but, on the contrary, it appears from the bill that the only connection they have with the matter in dispute is in discharge of the duty imposed upon them by law, and that does not confer upon them any interest in the controversy; and hence it must be held that they are nominal parties only, and the jurisdiction of this court depends upon the citizenship of the real parties to the controversy, to-wit, the railway companies. As to these the bill, as well as the petition for removal, shows that they are corporations organized under the laws of different states, to-wit, Iowa and Wisconsin; and consequently the right of removal existed, and the filing of the petition and bond in the state court terminated the jurisdiction of that court.

2. The question presented by the motion to dissolve the preliminary injunction is one of importance, and it is with extreme reluctance that I consider it upon a motion to dissolve. The bill avers that the complainant is a corporation, and has been such for nearly a year past, created for the purpose of building a railway from Sioux City to Des Moines, the construction of which has been commenced; that the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Railway Company is a corporation created under the laws of the state of Wisconsin, is operating a line of railway in Iowa, and desires to condemn the right of way over the premises in the bill described for the purpose of constructing a line of railway from Sioux City to Defiance, in the state of Iowa; that, upon the request of said defendant company, the sheriff of Woodbury county, on the nineteenth day of April, 1886, appointed commissioners to assess the damages to certain lands by reason of the alleged location of said defendant's line of railway over the same; that the said complainant, in the month of October, 1885, located its line of road, and surveyed the same, over the lands in the bill described, for the purpose and with the intent to construct its line over the same, and has commenced the construction of its line over a part of said lands, with the purpose of pushing the construction thereof as speedily as possible; that, previous to the time of the appointment of said commissioners by the sheriff for the appraisal of damages, the complainant had purchased from the owners of the realty, for its right of way over and across the same, certain tracts of land, fully described in the bill; that the complainant procured its right of way over said lands, for the public purpose of constructing its line of railway, before the defendant company acquired any right therein, or any right to condemn said premises for its right of way; that the strips of land in the bill described are necessary for the construction of complainant's road, and were purchased in good faith, for that sole use and purpose; that when it became evident that the complainant was about to build its line of road, and had commenced the same, the defendant company petitioned the sheriff of the county for the appointment of commissioners to appraise the damages for such right of way over said lands on behalf of defendant; that, unless restrained, the commissioners will appraise the damages, thereby condemning the land for the use of defendant; and an injunction is prayed restraining the defendant company, the sheriff, and the commissioners from proceeding with such condemnation. Before filing this bill, as already stated, a preliminary writ of injunction was obtained from the district court of Woodbury county, without notice to the defendant company.

The Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Railway Company, in its answer to said bill, avers that for several years past the defendant company has had in contemplation the construction of a line of railway from Sioux City to Defiance, thus connecting its system of railway in Dakota with its through line from Council Bluffs to Chicago; that, in pursuance of such plan in the summer of 1881 it caused surveys to be made for such line, and in the fall of 1881 it located the same; that in the year 1883 it procured, by ordinance duly passed, the right to lay a double track along Second street, in said Sioux City, to the eastern limits of the city, and did, during that year, construct its track easterly along said street, to within a few feet of the eastern corporate limits of said city, the same being done as the commencement of its said line to Defiance; that in October, 1884, it purchased 15 lots in Felt's addition to Sioux City, lying next east of the city limits, in direct line with the location of defendant's road, and did also purchase of said Felt a piece of land contiguous to and bounded by said lots, and...

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