Chicago, Rock Island Pacific Railway Company v. Lissa Martin

• Decision Date: 21 May 1900
• Docket Number: No. 135,135
• Citation: 20 S.Ct. 854,44 L.Ed. 1055,178 U.S. 245
• Parties: CHICAGO, ROCK ISLAND, & PACIFIC RAILWAY COMPANY and S. H. H. Clark et al. , Receivers of the Union Pacific Railway Company, Plffs. in Err. , v. LISSA MARTIN, Administratrix of the Estate of William Martin, Deceased
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

178 U.S. 245

20 S.Ct. 854

44 L.Ed. 1055

CHICAGO, ROCK ISLAND, & PACIFIC RAILWAY COMPANY and S. H. H. Clark et al., Receivers of the Union Pacific Railway Company, Plffs. in Err.,

v LISSA MARTIN, Administratrix of the Estate of William Martin, Deceased.

No. 135.

Submitted January 31, 1900.

Decided May 21, 1900.

This was an action brought by Lissa Martin as administratrix of William Martin, deceased, against the Chicago, Rock Island, & Pacific Railway Company, in the district court of Clay county, Kansas, to recover damages for the death of the decedent. Plaintiff's petition was filed January 26, 1894, and on February 14, 1894, the Chicago, Rock Island, & Pacific Railroad Company filed its separate answer thereto. February 20, 1894, defendants Clark and others, as receivers, presented their petition and bond, praying for the removal of the cause to the United States circuit court for the district of Kansas, on the ground that the case arose under the Constitution and laws of the United States, which application was overruled by the district court, and the receivers duly excepted. The cause was tried, the jury returned a verdict in favor of plaintiff and against all the defendants, and judgment was entered thereon. The cause was taken on error to the supreme court of Kansas by the defendants, and the judgment was by that court affirmed. 59 Kan. 437, 53 Pac. 461.

The refusal of the state court to remove the cause to the circuit court of the United States on the application of the receivers was relied on as error throughout the proceedings, and the supreme court of Kansas held, among other things, that the application for removal was properly denied because all the defendants were charged with jointly causing the death of plaintiff's intestate, and all did not join in the petition for removal.

Messrs. Winslow S. Pierce, A. L. Williams, W. R. Kelly, M. A. Low, N. H. Loomis, and W. F. Evans for plaintiffs in error.

Messrs. A. A. Godard and F. B. Dawes for defendant in error.

Mr. Chief Justice Fuller delivered the opinion of the court:

Assuming that as to the receivers the case may be said to have arisen under the Constitution and laws of the United States, the question is whether it was necessary for the Chicago, Rock Island, & Pacific Railroad Company, defendant, to join in the application of its codefendants, the receivers of the Union Pacific Railway Company, to effect a removal to the circuit court.

The Rock Island Company was not a corporation of Kansas, and all the receivers of the Union Pacific Railroad Company were citizens of some other state than the state of Kansas. But the receivers applied for removal, after the Rock Island Company had answered, on the ground that the suit was, as to them, 'one arising under the laws of the United States,' in that they were appointed receivers by the circuit court of the United States for the districts of Nebraska and Kansas, to take charge of and to operate a corporation created by the consolidation, under acts of Congress, of a corporation of the United States, a corporation of Kansas, and a corporation of Colorado.

The act of March 3, 1887, as corrected by the act of August 13, 1888 (25 Stat. at L. 433, chap. 866, § 2), provides:

'That any suit of a civil nature, at law or in equity, arising under the Constitution or laws of the United States, or treaties made, or which shall be made, under their authority, of which the circuit courts of the United States are given origina j urisdiction by the preceding section, which may now be pending, or which may hereafter be brought, in any state court, may be removed by the defendant or defendants therein to the circuit court of the United States for the proper district. Any other suit of a civil nature, at law or in equity, of which the circuit courts of the United States are given jurisdiction by the preceding section, and which are now pending, or which may hereafter be brought, in any state court, may be removed into the circuit court of the United States for the proper district by the defendant or defendants therein, being nonresidents of that state. And when in any suit mentioned in this section there shall be a controversy which is wholly between citizens of different states, and which can be fully determined as between them, then either one or more of the defendants actually interested in such controversy may remove said suit into the circuit court of the United States for the proper district. And where a suit is now pending, or may be hereafter brought, in any state court, in which there is a controversy between a citizen of the state in which the suit is brought and a citizen of another state, any defendant, being such citizen of another state, may remove such suit into the circuit court of the United States for the proper district, at any time before the trial thereof, when it shall be made to appear to said circuit court that from prejudice or local influence he will not be able to obtain justice in such state court.'

It thus appears on the fact of the statute that if a suit arises under the Constitution or laws of the United States, or if it is a suit between citizens of different states, the defendant, if there be but one, may remove, or the defendants if there be more than one; but where the suit is between citizens of different states, and there is a separable controversy, then either one or more of the defendants may remove.

Under the 1st clause of § 2 of the act of 1875 (18 Stat. at L. 470, chap. 137), which applied to 'either party,' but in its re-enactment in the 2d clause of § 2 of the act of 1887 above quoted, is confined to the defendant or defendants, it was well settled that a removal could not be effected unless all the parties on the same side of the controversy united in the petition; and so as to the 2d clause of the 2d section of the act of 1875, which corresponds with the 3d clause of the 2d section of the act of 1887, it was held that that clause only applied where there were two or more controversies in the same suit, one of which was wholly between citizens of different states. Hanrick v. Hanrick, 153 U. S. 192, 38 L. ed. 685, 14 Sup. Ct. Rep. 835, and cases cited; Torrence v. Shedd, 144 U. S. 527, 36 L. ed. 528, 12 Sup. Ct. Rep. 726, and cases cited. In the latter case Mr. Justice Gray said: 'As this court has repeatedly affirmed, not only in cases of joint contracts, but in...