Brown v. Fletcher

• Decision Date: 09 November 1910
• Docket Number: 2,029.
• Citation: 182 F. 963
• Parties: BROWN v. FLETCHER et al.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Sixth Circuit

182 F. 963

BROWN v. FLETCHER et al.

No. 2,029.

United States Court of Appeals, Sixth Circuit.

November 9, 1910

[Copyrighted Material Omitted] [Copyrighted Material Omitted]

H. R Martin and Walter B. Grant, for appellant.

Henry Ledyard and Henry Campbell, for appellees.

Before WARRINGTON and KNAPPEN, Circuit Judges, and McCALL, District judge.

WARRINGTON Circuit Judge (after stating the facts as above).

The right to maintain a bill in equity founded on diversity of citizenship to establish a claim against the legal representatives of an estate is not questioned; and it may be safely assumed for the purposes of this decision that complainant is entitled to maintain his bill unless one or both of the pleas must be sustained. Eddy v. Eddy, 168 F. (6th Circuit) 590, 598, 93 C.C.A. 586; Waterman v. Canal-louisiana Bank, 215 U.S. 33, 43, 30 Sup.Ct. 10, 54 L.Ed. . . . ; O'Toole v. Hurley, 115 Mich. 517, 73 N.W. 805.

It is to be observed that, in spite of all the litigation had and time consumed over the matters mentioned in the statement, the issues tendered by the bill-- that is to say, what if any pine land and lumber transactions were ever had between the deceased principals White and Fletcher, and what would result from discovery and a proper accounting-- have never in fact been tested and tried, except in a court whose right to proceed to final decree was lost through the death of Fletcher. Brown v. Fletcher's Estate, 146 Mich. 401, 109 N.W. 686; s.c., 210 U.S. 82, 28 Sup.Ct. 702, 52 L.Ed. 966; Brown v. Fletcher (C.C.) 140 F. 639. The rule is that a subsisting judgment or decree rendered in a suit between given parties will not operate to bar a second suit between the same parties or their privies unless the matter in controversy in the latter suit was determined on its merits in the first suit. In Hughes v. United States, 4 Wall. 232, 237, 18 L.Ed. 303, Justice Field stated the rule thus:

'In order that a judgment may constitute a bar to another suit, it must be rendered in a proceeding between the same parties or their privies, and the point of controversy must be the same in both cases, and must be determined on its merits. If the first suit was dismissed for defect of pleadings, or parties, or a misconception of the form of proceeding, or the want of jurisdiction, or was disposed of on any ground which did not go to the merits of the action, the judgment rendered will prove no bar to another suit.' Another mode of expressing the rule is found in Baker v. Cummings, 181 U.S. 117, 124, 21 Sup.Ct. 578, 581 (45 L.Ed. 776), as stated by the late Justice Peckham:

'Stated generally and without detail, the theory of the law is that matters which have once been fully investigated between the parties and determined by the court shall not be again contested, and that the judgment of the court upon matters thus determined shall be conclusive on the parties and never subject to further inquiry.'

The principle is that the right shall be accorded to every litigant to have the issue he tenders submitted to a competent tribunal and once heard and disposed of on its merits; but that (apart from new trial, appeal or error) as against the same party this right shall not be given twice. As observed by Mr. Justice Harlan in Southern Pacific R. v. United States, 168 U.S. 1, 49, 18 Sup.Ct. 18, 27, 42 L.Ed. 355:

'The aid of judicial tribunals would not be invoked for the vindication of rights of person and property, if, as between parties and their privies, conclusiveness did not attend the judgments of such tribunals in respect of all matters properly put in issue and actually determined by them.'

See, also, Keller v. Stolzenbach (C.C.) 20 F. 47; Bunker Hill & Sullivan Min. Co. v. Shoshone Min. Co., 109 F. (9th Circuit) 504, 507, 47 C.C.A. 200; Ex parte Loung June (D.C.) 160 F. 251; In re Ward's Estate, 152 Mich. 218, 236, 237, 116 N.W. 23.

It is earnestly contended on behalf of appellees respecting the claim presented by the appellant to the commissioners of claims that it 'was sufficient in form to permit of opening up the entire controversy and a full presentation of the merits. ' It is not said that the entire controversy was in fact presented and determined on its merits. The claim is that this might have been done, and the failure to do so was the equivalent of such a submission and determination. The claim as presented bears date of April 6, 1904, is addressed to the commissioners and signed by Brown, and is as follows:

'You are hereby notified that Albert W. Brown is a creditor of said estate in the sum of four hundred and four thousand two hundred and fifty-four dollars and twelve cents ($404,254.12), and interest thereon at the rate of six (6) per cent. per annum, from the 14th day of April, 1903.

'Said claim is based upon the final decree of the Supreme Judicial Court for the commonwealth of Massachusetts entered on the 14th day of April, 1903, and which decree was entered in a suit in said court to which the said George N. Fletcher, deceased, in his lifetime, was a party defendant, and which decree purports to and does bind the estate of the said decedent to the payment of the full amount decreed to be paid, as aforesaid, under its provisions.

'A copy of the said decree and the proceedings in said suit, duly certified and attested under the act of Congress and the law of this state, is ready to be produced and proved before you as the commissioners on claims in said estate, and the said claimant, Albert W. Brown, does and will claim for the said decree when produced and proven according to law the same full force, faith, and credit to which the same is entitled under the laws of said commonwealth of Massachusetts within the state of Michigan, against the estate of said George N. Fletcher, deceased.

'The said Albert W. Brown therefore demands and claims against the estate of the said George N. Fletcher, deceased, the full sum of $404,254.12, with interest thereon at the rate of six (6) per cent. per annum from the 14th day of April, 1903.

'You are also notified that the said claimant is now ready to present and prove his said claim without delay, and you are respectfully requested to fix an early date for the hearing thereof in accordance with the statute in such case made and provided.'

It will be noticed that the claim is in terms based solely upon the Massachusetts decree, and contains no mention of the merits, or even of the nature, of the demand which resulted in the decree relied upon, except as reference is made to 'a copy of said decree and of the proceedings in said suit' to be produced before the commissioners. The only evidence offered to prove the claim was an exemplification of the record of the Massachusetts court. This course was pursued, as stated in argument, on the theory that the evidence of the cause of complaint of the White estate against the Fletcher estate was merged in the decree. In Mason v. Eldred, 6 Wall. 232, 234, 18 L.Ed. 783, Justice Field, having under consideration the question whether under the joint debtor act of Michigan the note in suit had been merged in a certain judgment, stated the general rule and the effect of merger thus:

'If the note in suit was merged in the judgment, then the judgment is a bar to the action, and an exemplification of its record is admissible, for it has long been settled that under the plea of the general issue in assumpsit evidence may be received to show, not merely that the alleged cause of action never existed, but also to show that it did not subsist at the commencement of the suit. On the other hand, if the note is not thus merged, it still forms a subsisting cause of action, and the judgment is immaterial and irrelevant.'

This rule was applied, Justice Miller announcing the opinion, in Eldred v. Bank, 17 Wall. 547, 548, 552, 21 L.Ed. 685. It is scarcely necessary to say that the doctrine of merger is applied to judgments rendered in courts of a state or district other than that of the court in which the question arises, as well as to judgments of courts of the same jurisdiction. In Schuyler v. Israel, 120 U.S. 506, 509, 7 Sup.Ct. 648, 649, 30 L.Ed. 707, when passing upon the sufficiency of an answer to an action on a note brought in a federal court of Missouri, setting up a judgment previously rendered on the same note in a federal court of Texas, Justice Miller said:

'That judgment must be held to merge the evidence of the debt, whether that evidence be parol or written, in the judgment first recovered.'

See, also, McCadden v. Slauson, 96 Tenn. 586, 590, 36 S.W. 378; 2 Black on Judgments (2d Ed.) Sec. 864, and cases cited. The doctrine of merger applies equally to a final decree in equity. Say the court in Mutual Life Ins. Co. v. Newton, 50 N.J.Law, 571, 577, 14 A. 756, 759:

'If the decree is final, then its result is to merge the original cause of action.'

See, also, 2 Black on Judgments (2d Ed.) Sec. 675; Pennington v. Gibson, 57 U.S. 65, 77, 14 L.Ed. 847; Nations v. Johnson, 65 U.S. 195, 16 L.Ed. 628.

The commissioners decided that the Massachusetts court was without jurisdiction to enter a decree, and Brown's claim was consequently rejected. When the case was taken on appeal to the circuit court of Wayne county, it was presented to the court with the understanding that a jury should be considered as in attendance, and that the determination of the court should take the shape of a direction to render a verdict either for or against plaintiff's claim. This was carried out and in the charge formulated for the purpose the history of the litigation in Massachusetts was in substance stated, and thereupon the court said:

'I am of the opinion that the claim of the plaintiff was properly disallowed by the

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