Bowles v. Troll

• Decision Date: 02 December 1914
• Docket Number: No. 17576.,17576.
• Citation: 171 S.W. 326,262 Mo. 377
• Parties: BOWLES v. TROLL.
• Court: Missouri Supreme Court

171 S.W. 326

262 Mo. 377

BOWLES v. TROLL.

No. 17576.

Supreme Court of Missouri, Division No. 1.

December 2, 1914.

1. COURTS (§ 488) — CONFLICTING JURISDICTION — TRANSFER OF CAUSES — LAW OF CASE — RIGHT TO CORRECT ERROR.

Though the Supreme Court having once denied a motion to retransfer a cause to one of the courts of appeals might treat the question as foreclosed by its former ruling, yet, as it is a court for the correction of errors of other courts, it should correct its own decision if it be erroneous.

2. COURTS (§ 37) — JURISDICTION — OBJECTIONS — TIME FOR MAKING.

Questions of jurisdiction may be raised at any time in the trial court or on appeal.

3. COURTS (§ 231) — STATE COURTS — MISSOURI — JURISDICTION OF SUPREME COURT.

The Supreme Court is without jurisdiction of an appeal in an action where the nonresident guardian of an insane person sought to compel the local guardian to deliver up the corpus of the estate, which amounted to about $10,000, for the right of the ward to the corpus of the estate was not in controversy, and it cannot be held that the right of the local guardian to handle the estate involved an amount equal to $7,500.

Appeal from St. Louis Circuit Court; James E. Withrow, Judge.

Action by John W. Bowles, Iowa guardian of Maggie V. Wilson, insane, against Harry Troll, public administrator, Missouri guardian of Maggie V. Wilson, insane. From a judgment for defendant, plaintiff appealed to the St. Louis Court of Appeals (172 Mo. App. 102, 154 S. W. 871), which transferred the case to the Supreme Court. Retransferred to the St. Louis Court of Appeals.

Warren D. Isenberg, of Los Angeles, Cal., and A. V. Proudfoot, of Indianola, Iowa, for appellant. Marshall & Henderson, for respondent.

LAMM, J.

Plaintiff sued in equity in the St. Louis circuit court. The object and general nature of his bill was to procure a decree in his favor as Iowa guardian requiring Troll, the Missouri guardian, to make a final settlement of his accounts, and pay over the balance in his hands, that is, transfer the estate, and for general relief; the bill counting on the theory the insane ward resided in Iowa, was adjudged insane, and confined in an asylum there, that plaintiff is the primary or domiciliary guardian, and defendant the ancillary guardian, that the purposes of the Missouri guardianship have been fully subserved, and to continue it would subject the estate of the ward to the wasting burden of double costs and expense.

The case was tried in a notably unconventional way, on an agreed statement of facts, in substance as follows: Mrs. Wilson is an insane person domiciled for 20 years in Iowa, adjudged insane by a court of competent jurisdiction in Warren county in that state in 1897, and since then confined in an Iowa hospital, the Clarinda Insane Asylum. That in 1897 Bowles, plaintiff, was duly appointed her guardian in Iowa by a named court of competent jurisdiction and has ever since acted as such. That in 1906 defendant Troll, public administrator of St. Louis, was duly appointed guardian in Missouri, and is now acting as such. That plaintiff as guardian is under a $20,000 bond in the proper court in Warren county, Iowa, which bond is now in full force and effect. That said court authorized plaintiff by its due orders to collect by proper proceeding the estate of said ward in the hands of defendant. That the ward is a widow with three children, one a minor about 14 years of age. That she has no estate in Iowa except a widow's pension, a small one, received from the United States government. That plaintiff is a relative of said ward by marriage, and a fit and suitable person to be guardian at the domicile of the ward. That plaintiff at the time of defendant's appointment as guardian, being a nonresident of Missouri, could not be appointed guardian in this state. That defendant's appointment as such was for the purpose of collecting funds of the ward's estate in Missouri. That Troll as such guardian has in his hands about $10,000. That the ward is not indebted, so far as known, to any person in Missouri. That two years have passed since Troll's appointment. That notice of his appointment was duly given as required by law. And that all claims proved against his ward's estate in Missouri have been paid.

On such agreed facts, the court found for defendant, and plaintiff appealed on due steps to the St. Louis Court of Appeals. That court on its own motion transferred the case to this court on the theory "the amount in dispute" exceeds $7,500 exclusive of costs, basing its ruling on the doctrine of Gartside v. Gartside, 42 Mo. App. 513, a case transferred here and of which we retained jurisdiction (113 Mo. 348, 20 S. W. 669). Subsequently, it seems, a motion was filed in this court to remand the instant case to the St. Louis Court of Appeals on the grounds of our lack of jurisdiction. This motion was overruled — we now think improvidently. Undoubtedly we could take the question as foreclosed once for all by our ruling on the motion and proceed to decide the cause on its merits. But, on the other hand, this being a court of errors, the power to correct our own is self-evidently an integral part and parcel of the power to correct the errors of other courts, and the duty to correct them in the same case at the first opportunity is always present where a ruling is sharply wrong and unsettles correct practice, or the law. Star Bottling Co. v. Exposition Co., 240 Mo. loc. cit. 643, 644, 144 S. W. 776. Especially is this so on so vital a question as jurisdiction — a...