Baltimore Co v. Fifth Baptist Church of Washington

• Decision Date: 05 January 1891
• Citation: 137 U.S. 568,34 L.Ed. 784,11 S.Ct. 185
• Parties: BALTIMORE & P. R. CO. v. FIFTH BAPTIST CHURCH OF WASHINGTON, (two cases.)
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

137 U.S. 568

11 S.Ct. 185

34 L.Ed. 784

BALTIMORE & P. R. CO. v. FIFTH BAPTIST CHURCH OF WASHINGTON, (two cases.)

January 5, 1891.

Enoch Totten, for plaintiff in error.

M. F. Morris, J. J. Darlington, and Geo. D. Hamilton, for defendant in error.

GRAY, J.

These two actions are in the nature of actions on the case for the continuance of a nuisance to the plaintiff's use and enjoyment of its house of public worship, by the noise, smoke, cinders, ashes, and vapors from the defendant's adjoining engine-house, repair-shop, and locomotive engines, and by the obstruction of access to the plaintiff's building by the defendant's unlawful use of its side track in front of it. The plaintiff heretofore brought in the court below a similar action against the defendant for maintaining the same nuisance from April 1, 1874, to March 22, 1877, and at the trial thereof on the general issue recovered a verdict and judgment for $4,500, which was affirmed by this court, and the amount thereof, with interest, was paid by the defendant. Baltimore, etc., R. Co. v. Fifth Baptist Church, 108 U. S. 317, 2 Sup. Ct. Rep. 719. The present actions were brought and tried separately; one of them was brought March 24, 1880, for damages since March 24, 1877, and resulted on March 24, 1886, in a verdict and judgment for $6,000; and the other was brought June 11, 1883, for damages since June 11, 1880, and resulted on April 22, 1886, in a verdict and judgment for $7,000. In each of these two actions there were the following proceedings: The declaration was headed 'The Fifth Baptist Church of Washington, D. C., by Its Trustees, v. The Baltimore and Potomac Railroad Company,' and alleged that the plaintiff was a body corporate in the District of Columbia under and by virtue of the general corporation act of May 5, 1870, c. 80, § 2, (16 St. 99, 100; Rev. St. D. C. §§ 533-544.) The defendant pleaded in bar: (1) 'That the said plaintiff was not, at the time of the commencement of this suit, and never was, a body corporate of politic, as set forth and alleged in and by said declaration.' (2) Not guilty. The plaintiff joined issue on these pleas. The plaintiff upon the issue presented by the first plea, and to prove its user of corporate rights, offered the following evidence, which was admitted against the defendant's objection and exception: (1) The original of the following certificate of incorporation, signed and sealed by the six persons named therein: 'We, C. C. Meador, George M. Kendall, John N. Henderson, Samuel M. Yeatman, James C. Deatley, and Samuel S. Taylor, of Washington City, in the District of Columbia, do hereby certify that we have been duly elected 'Trustees of the Fifth Baptist Church of Washington City, D. C.,' (commonly called 'The Island Baptist Church',) and that this certificate is made, signed, and sealed for the purpose of obtaining corporate rights and privileges for the said 'Fifth Baptist Church,' a religious society worshipping at present in their church edifice on D street south, between Four and a Half and Sixth streets in said city of Washington, under the provisions of an act of congress approved May 5, 1870, entitled 'An act to provide for the creation of corporations in the District of Columbia by general law.' In testimony whereof we hereunto set our hands and affix our seals this twenty-fourth day of August, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and seventy-one.' Annexed to this paper were a notary public's certificate of its acknowledgment on the same day by these six persons; an affidavit of one of them, dated May 1, 1885, that the statements in the certificate of incorporation were true; a memorandum of the recorder that the paper was recorded September 5, 1871; and another memorandum that it was recorded May 1, 1885. (2) A recorder's copy of the certificate of incorporation, acknowledgment, and affidavit, as recorded May 1, 1885. (3) That in the year 1871 it became necessary for the plaintiff, in order to complete its church edifice, to borrow money upon a mortgage of its land; and that to promote this object, and upon the recommendation of its finance committee, a special meeting was called, and was held on July 2, 1871, at which the church (which had been known as the 'Island Baptist Church') resolved to become incorporated under the name stated in the above certificate of incorporation, and elected as its trustees the six persons named therein, and fixed their term of office at three years; and thereupon that certificate was prepared and signed by the trustees and recorded. (4) Three deeds, respectively dated September 26, 1871, September 18, 1872, and November 10, 1874, from the six persons named in the above certificate of incorporation, describing themselves as 'trustees of the Fifth Baptist Church of Washington City, D. C.,' reciting its incorporation under the general corporation act, and its resolution authorizing them to execute the deeds, and conveying the church building and land, in trust and by way of mortgage, to secure the payment of various sums of money. (5) Two deeds of release of the same building and land, dated No. 9, 1874, from the grantees to the grantors in the first two of the trust-deeds aforesaid. (6) The record of the judgment in the former action between these parties. The plaintiff also introduced, without objection, evidence tending to show 'that its present church edifice was begun about the year 1866, and was completed at a cost of about $22,000, exclusive of the ground; that the property is worth about $30,000, and has been occupied and used by the plaintiff's society or congregation since the year 1867 as its place of religious worship; and that during the period covered by this suit its actual church membership, consisting, as in all Baptist churches, of persons who have been baptized after a profession of faith, numbered about four hundred persons, exclusive of the persons attending services there, as members of the congregation who were not members of the church.' It may be that, as held by the court below in 4 Mackey, 43, at a former stage of one of these cases, the original certificate of incorporation, not stating the date of election or the term of office of the trustees, nor supported by affidavit, as required by statute, was not sufficient of itself to prove the plaintiff's existence as a corporation, either de jure or de facto; and that the adding of an affidavit to the certificate, and recording it anew, since the commencement of these actions, could not avail the plaintiff. But the certificate of incorporation, as originally drawn up, taken in connection with the other evidence now introduced, and especially the record of the former action in which this plaintiff as a corporation recovered judgment against this defendant without any objection being taken to the plaintiff's capacity to sue, is clearly competent and sufficient, as between these parties, to prove that the plaintiff had in good faith attempted to legally organize as a corporation, and had long acted as such, and was at least a corporation de facto, which is all that is necessary to enable it to maintain an action against any one, other than the state, who has contracted with the corporation, or who has done it a wrong. Bank v. Dandridge, 12 Wheat. 64, 72; Conard v. Insurance Co., 1 Pet. 386, 450 Ch ubb v. Upton, 95 U. S. 665; ...