Bodley v. Emporia Nat. Bank

• Decision Date: 10 December 1887
• Parties: O. G. BODLEY, et al., v. THE EMPORIA NATIONAL BANK
• Court: Kansas Supreme Court

16 P. 88

38 Kan. 59

O. G. BODLEY, et al., v. THE EMPORIA NATIONAL BANK

Supreme Court of Kansas

December 10, 1887

Error from Franklin District Court.

ACTION by The Bank against Bodley and two others, to recover upon a promissory note. Judgment for the plaintiff, at the January Term, 1886. The defendants bring the case to this court. The opinion states the facts.

Judgment affirmed.

C. B Mason, and Jno. W. Deford, for plaintiffs in error.

Wm. H Clark, and W. Littlefield, for defendant in error.

JOHNSTON J. All the Justices concurring.

OPINION

JOHNSTON, J.:

The Emporia National Bank brought this action, in the district court of Franklin county, against O. G. Bodley, F. J. Bodley and J. D. Bodley, to recover upon a promissory note given by them on June 17, 1882, promising to pay on June 17, 1884, to the order of Wm. H. Woodlief, $ 2,800, with interest from date at ten per cent. per annum. On May 8, 1883, a payment of $ 550 was indorsed on the note, and shortly afterward it was duly transferred to A. M. Blair, who in turn, and before the maturity of the note, indorsed and sold it to the bank. The Bodleys admitted signing the note, but claimed that the consideration thereof was $ 800, loaned to them by Woodlief and that the remaining $ 2,000 was the consideration for the sub-letting of a mail contract for carrying the United States mail in Omaha, Nebraska, from July 1, 1882, to June 30, 1886. The original contractor was Riley W. Woodlief, from whom Win. H. Woodlief, the payee of the note, procured a sub-letting to the Bodleys, and for which the remaining $ 2,000 of the note was a bonus. They further alleged that the payee made false representations to them respecting the extent and kind of service required under the contract, and that the indorsers and the bank had notice of the fraudulent character and illegality of the note, and the claims made by them against it. The Bodleys petitioned for a removal of the cause to the circuit court of the United States, for the reason that it was a suit arising under the laws of the United States, contending that the note sued on was an assignment of a claim against the United States, and fell within the prohibition of § 3477 of the Revised Statutes of the United States. The petition was accompanied by the required bond, and the district court granted the petition and ordered a transfer of the cause. When the record was taken to the federal court, a motion was made to remand, on the ground that the action did not arise under the laws of the United States, nor did the answers of the Bodleys present any federal question. A hearing of that motion was had, and it resulted in an order remanding the cause, and dismissing it from that court for want of jurisdiction. A trial was subsequently had in the state court, where judgment was given in favor of the...