Chicot County, Ark v. Sherwood

• Decision Date: 03 April 1893
• Docket Number: No. 170,170
• Citation: 13 S.Ct. 695,148 U.S. 529,37 L.Ed. 546
• Parties: CHICOT COUNTY, ARK., v. SHERWOOD et al
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

148 U.S. 529

13 S.Ct. 695

37 L.Ed. 546

CHICOT COUNTY, ARK.,

v SHERWOOD et al.

No. 170.

April 3, 1893.

D. H. Reynolds, for plaintiff in error.

Mr. Justice JACKSON delivered the opinion of the court.

This was an action by the defendants in error, citizens of the state of New York, against Chicot county, Ark., upon 17 bonds and 80 interest warrants or coupons thereto attached, forming a portion of an issue of bonds made and executed by that county in 1872 for the amount of a stock subscription made by it to the Mississippi, Ouachita & Red River Railroad Company. The bonds and coupons sued on were in the following form:

'United States of America, State of Arkansas.

'No. 3. $500.

'It is hereby certified that the county of Chicot is indebted unto and will pay the Mississippi, Ouachita and Red River Railroad Company or bearer, on the first day of January, 1887, five hundred dollars, lawful money of the United States of America, with interest at the rate of six per centum per annum, payable semiannually, on the first day of January and July of each year, at the Union Trust Company, in the city of New York, on the presentation and surrender of the proper coupon hereto annexed. This bond is one of a series of two hundred, numbered from one to two hundred, inclusively, of like date, tenor, and amount, issued under an act of the general assembly of the state of Arkansas, entitled 'An act to authorize counties to subscribe stock in railroads,' approved July 23, 1868, and in obedience to the vote of the people of said county at an election held in accordance with the provisions of said act, authorizing the subscription of one thousand dollars to the capital stock of said railroad company.

'In witness whereof, the said county has caused to be affixed hereto its seal, and has caused the same to be attested by the signature of its county and probate judge, countersigned by the signature of its county clerk, who also signs the coupons hereto annexed, at their office, in said county, this 11th day of May, 1872. Jas. W. Mason,

'County and Probate Judge.

'M. W. Graves, County Clerk.

'Receivable in payment of all county taxes.

'State of Arkansas: The treasurer of the county of Chicot will pay fifteen dollars to bearer at the office of the Union Trust Company, in the city of New York, on the first day of January, 1887, being amount of interest on bond No. 3.

'M. W. Graves, County Clerk.'

Judgment was rendered in favor of the plaintiffs for the amount of the bonds and coupons sued on, and the county prosecutes this writ of error therefrom, assigning as grounds of reversal First, that the circuit court had no jurisdiction to entertain the suit; and, secondly, that said court erred in sustaining the plaintiffs' demurrer to the plea or answer of the county, and in rendering judgment against it, upon its delining to make further answer in bar or defence of the action.

After being summoned in the usual manner, the defendant moved to dismiss the suit on the grounds that since the passage of an act of the legislature of Arkansas, on February 27, 1879, repealing all laws authorizing counties in the state to sue and be sued, the county could not be sued or proceeded against in any court, state or federal, by complaint and summons, or otherwise than in the manner provided by said act; that the county had not been brought into the circuit court in any manner authorized by law, so as to acquire jurisdiction over the same; that the plaintiffs had not presented their demand to the county court of Chicot county, duly verified according to the requirements of the statute, for allowance or rejection; and that without such verification and demand no case against or controversy with the county could arise of which any state or federal court could take cognizance or jurisdiction. The second section of the act of February 27, 1879, on which this motion was based, provided 'that hereafter all persons having demands against any county shall present the same, duly verified according to law, to the county court of such county for allowance or rejection. From the order of the county court therein, appeals may be prosecuted as now provided by law. If in any appeal the judgment of the county court is reversed, the judgment of reversal shall be certified by the court rendering the same to the county court, and the county court shall thereupon enter the judgment of the superior court as its own.'

The circuit court overruled this motion to dismiss the suit, and this action of the court constitutes the first error relied on for reversal of its judgment. It is claimed for plaintiff in error that, inasmuch as the courts of general jurisdiction in Arkansas have no original jurisdiction to hear and determine cases like the present since the passage of said act of February 27, 1879, the courts of the United States can exercise no such jurisdiction. In the case of Nevada Co. v. Hicks, 50 Ark. 416, 420, 8 S. W. Rep. 180, it was said by the supreme court of Arkansas that, 'whilst it is true, by the act of February 27, 1879, counties cannot be sued in the ordinary way of bringing suits, still judgments may be and are rendered against them. Every allowance of a claim by the county is a judgment; and unquestionably, when an appeal is prosecuted from the action of the county court in allowing or rejecting a claim, the decision of the appellate court is a judgment; and when the judgment of the county court is reversed the judgment of reversal, when certified to the county court, is required to be entered as the judgment of the county court.'

If, under this construction of the act, the allowance or rejection by the county court of any demand against the county, duly verified according to law, has the force and effect of a judgment for or against the county, from which an appeal will lie, it would seem that the making or presenting a demand against the county to the county court is, to all intents and purposes, such a legal proceeding as would permit the application of the rule which plaintiff in error invokes to defeat the jurisdiction of the federal court; for in the case of Gaines v. Fuentes, 92 U. S. 10, 20, cited and relied on to support its position, it is said: 'If by the law obtaining in the state, customary or statutory, they [suits] can be maintained in a state court, whatever designation that court may have, we think they may be maintained by original process in a federal court where the parties are on one side citizens of Louisiana, and on the other citizens of other states.'

If, however, the...