Bacon v. Iowa Cent. Ry. Co.
| Citation | 157 Iowa 493,137 N.W. 1011 |
| Parties | BACON v. IOWA CENT. RY. CO. |
| Decision Date | 22 October 1912 |
| Court | United States State Supreme Court of Iowa |
OPINION TEXT STARTS HERE
Appeal from District Court, Mahaska County; John F. Talbott, Judge.
Action for damages resulted in judgment against the defendant, from which it appeals. Affirmed.George W. Seevers and W. H. Bremner, both of Minneapolis, Minn., and John O. Malcolm, of Oskaloosa, for appellant.
John McCoy, L. T. Shangle, J. B. Bolton, and D. C. Waggoner, all of Oskaloosa, for appellee.
This action was begun September 20, 1905, by the service of an original notice, in which the claim was said to be $10,000. In the petition, filed two days later, plaintiff alleged that “the defendant's employés negligently and carelessly permitted the said Martin W. Lockhart to be killed, to the plaintiff's damage in the sum of $10,000,” but demanded judgment for $1,990 only. The defendant filed an answer on September 30, 1905, admitting its corporate existence, and that the plaintiff's intestate was blind, and denying all other allegations of the petition. It filed a petition for removal to the Circuit Court of the United States February 2d following, therein averring diverse citizenship, and that the amount in controversy, exclusive of all interest and costs, exceeded $2,000, and also a bond approved by the clerk of the district court of Mahaska county. This petition was not presented to the district court, nor, so far as appears, was its attention directed thereto prior to October 6, 1910. Notwithstanding this, the clerk of the district court made out and certified a transcript of the papers on file and proceedings, which was filed in the Circuit Court of the United States March 29, 1906. The record does not indicate that plaintiff ever appeared in that court, but several orders continuing the cause were entered of record, and on December 5, 1908, an order “that unless same be noticed for trial at the next term of this court, or good reason shown for not so doing, the same shall be dismissed for want of prosecution.” At the May, 1909, term of that court the cause was so dismissed at plaintiff's costs. In the meantime the case had not been placed on the printed docket of the district court of Mahaska county, but after the dismissal in the federal court, and on September 19, 1910, an amended and substituted petition was filed, in which the judgment prayed was the same as in the original petition, and on October 6th following the petition for removal was overruled. Nine days later the defendant filed an answer thereto, denying the allegations of the amended and substituted petition, and pleading contributory negligence and the statute of limitations. Later a second amended and substituted petition, with prayer as before stated, was filed, and defendant moved that the cause of action be dismissed, and the two petitions last filed by plaintiff stricken from the files, on the ground that said cause had been transferred to the federal court, and there dismissed. This motion was overruled, and trial thereafter was had on the merits.
[1][2][3][4] 1. The point first made is that the amount in controversy exceeded $2,000, and for this reason the court erred in overruling the petition for removal to the federal court. While conceding that the prayer was for a judgment of less than $2,000, it is argued that, inasmuch as the petition alleged the damages to be $10,000, it, rather than the prayer, should control, relying on section 3775 of the Code, which declares that “the relief granted to plaintiff if there be no answer, cannot exceed that which he has demanded in his petition; in any other case the court may grant him any relief consistent with the case made by the petition and embraced within the issues.” It may be conceded that there are authorities which seem to hold that, under like statute, the prayer for relief becomes wholly immaterial after an answer has been filed. See Marquat v. Marquat, 12 N. Y. 336; 1 Bates' Pleading, etc., 315. An examination of these cases, however, discloses that the reasoning in each is broader than the decision. Thus in Marquat v. Marquat the action was for the specific performance of an agreement to execute a mortgage to secure a note, and for other relief. The defendants answered, denying any agreement to execute a mortgage, but alleging that the plaintiff merely loaned them money. The court denied specific performance, but entered judgment for the amount due on the note. Other decisions are to the effect that the prayer for relief forms no part of the petition, and hence that its sufficiency and character must be determined from the facts stated rather than from the prayer for relief. Henry v. McKittrick, 42 Kan. 485, 22 Pac. 576;Tiffin Glass Co. v. Stoehr, 54 Ohio St. 157, 43 N. E. 279. In actions like this, the damages are unliquidated, and a prayer for judgment in a sum less than the damages alleged is equivalent to a remittance or waiver of the difference. Dillon in his work on Removal of Causes, § 93, says: “The value of the matter in dispute, for the purpose of removal, is to be determined by reference to the amount claimed in the declaration, petition, or bill of complaint.” Of course this will not control when the allegations of the petition disclose the amount in controversy to be less than that for which judgment is prayed. 1 Ency. Pl. & Pr. 712; Gorman v. Havird, 141 U. S. 206, 11 Sup. Ct. 943, 35 L. Ed. 717. And the sum for which judgment is prayed is determinative of the amount in controversy with reference to the right of appeal. Hiatt v. Nelson, 100 Iowa, 750, 69 N. W. 553;Nash v. Beckman, 86 Iowa, 249, 53 N. W. 228;Cooper v. Dillon, 56 Iowa, 367, 9 N. W. 302. “In all actions sounding in damages the plaintiff is limited to his demand therefor in his declaration or complaint, and can recover no more than the amount specified.” 5 Ency. Pl. & Pr. 712.
Our statute requires the petition to contain “a demand of the relief to which the plaintiff considers himself entitled, and if for money, the amount thereof”; and the rule prevails in this state under the statute first quoted that the court may not grant relief other than that prayed, unless included therein, or enter judgment or decree different from, unless equivalent to, that demanded. Bottorff v. Lewis, 121 Iowa, 27, 95 N. W. 262;Browne v. Kiel, 117 Iowa, 316, 90 N. W. 624;Rees v. Shepherdson, 95 Iowa, 431, 64 N. W. 286;Marder v. Wright, 70 Iowa, 42, 29 N. W. 799;Tice v. Derby, 59 Iowa, 312, 13 N. W. 301;Lafever v. Stone, 55 Iowa, 49, 7 N. W. 400;O'Connell v. Cotter, 44 Iowa, 48. See, also, Winney v. Sandwich Mfg. Co., 86 Iowa, 608, 53 N. W. 421, 18 L. R. A. 524;Johnson v. Rider, 84 Iowa, 50, 50 N. W. 36;Humphreys v. Daggs, 1 G. Greene, 435. Following these decisions, we necessarily reach the conclusion that the amount in controversy was less than $2,000, the amount for which judgment was prayed, notwithstanding the allegation in the petition that the plaintiff had been damaged more than that sum. As precisely in point, see Stark v. Port Blakely Milling Co., 44 Wash. 309, 87 Pac. 339;Smith v. Railway Co., 3 N. D. 17, 53 N. W. 173;Lake Erie & W. Ry. Co. v. Juday, 19 Ind. App. 436, 49 N. E. 843.
[5] 2. The amount in controversy then affirmatively appeared from the pleadings on file to be less than $2,000, though the petition for removal asserted it to exceed that sum, and under the act of Congress approved March 3, 1875, as amended by the acts of Congress approved March 3, 1887, and August 13, 1888, the cause was not removable. Section 3 of the act referred to provides:
[6] The defendant filed a petition for removal, accompanied by a bond with the clerk of the district...
To continue reading
Request your trial