City of Laredo v. Nalle

• Decision Date: 26 January 1886
• Docket Number: Case No. 2112
• Citation: 65 Tex. 359
• Parties: THE CITY OF LAREDO v. JOSEPH NALLE.
• Court: Texas Supreme Court

65 Tex. 359

THE CITY OF LAREDO

v.JOSEPH NALLE.

Case No. 2112

Supreme Court of Texas.

Jan. 26, 1886.

ERROR from Webb. Tried below before the Hon. J. C. Russell.

The opinion states the case.

Chas. McLane, City Attorney, for plaintiff in error, that a municipal corporation, in the absence of a statute to the contrary, is exempt from the process of garnishment, cited: R. S., 183-220; City of Galveston v. Posnainsky, 62 Tex. 118.

That a special fund provided for the purposes of a public building is not subject to garnishment, he cited: Dillon on Mun. Corp., 128, 129; Waples on Attachment, 236, 237; Divine v. Harvil, 18 Am. Dec., 194.

Showalter & Nicholson, for defendant in error, that a municipal corporation,in the absence of a statute to the contrary, is subject to garnishment process for an ordinary debt due to a third person, cited: John Highland v. City of Galveston, W. & W. Con. Rep., sec. 623; City of Austin v. Erwin, Tex. Law Rev., vol. 3, p. 310; Pendleton v. Perkins and City of St. Louis, 49 Mo. 565; Dillon on Mun. Corp., vol. 1, p. 129.

WILLIE, CHIEF JUSTICE.

Joseph Nalle sued L. J. Giraud upon a promissory note, and, upon the usual and proper allegations, obtained a writ of garnishment against the city of Laredo. Nalle, thereafter, took judgment by default against Giraud. The city appeared and answered by motion to quash the garnishment, and an admission that it was indebted to Giraud in the sum of $10,200.50, which was a balance due Giraud, as contractor, for building a city hall and market house for the city; that the sum was not a part of the general revenues of the city, but part of a special fund created for the purpose of paying for the city hall and market house. The cause was tried before the judge below without a jury, and judgment was rendered in favor of Nalle against the city, for the full amount of the judgment rendered in favor of defendant in error against Giraud. From that judgment the city appeals to this court, and the only question is, was the city of Laredo subject to the writ of garnishment sued out against it in this case?

We have no statute expressly providing that municipal corporations shall be exempt from garnishment, nor is there anything in those sections of our Revised Statutes which regulate the process inconsistent with its application to such corporations. Courts holding that cities are exempt from the writ, do so generally upon the ground of “the inconvenience and impolicy of interfering with the operations of municipal bodies by drawing them into controversies with which they have no concern, and diverting the public moneys from the channel in which, by the acts and ordinances of the corporation, they are required to flow.” Drake on Attachment, sec. 516. Some courts, however, base their decisions upon the ground that an execution cannot be levied on the property of a city, and hold that as debts against a city cannot be collected by execution, neither can they be collected through garnishment. Mervin v. City of Chicago, 45 Ill. 133;City of Chicago v. Hasley, 25 Ill. 595.

On the contrary, “the argument in favor of holding such bodies as garnishees is derived from the policy of the law; which subjects all a debtor's property to the payment of his debts.” Drake on Attachment, sec. 516.

The argument, drawn from the impolicy and inconvenience of calling off municipal officers from their duties to answer writs of garnishment, can be used with equal force to show that no suit whatever should be allowed against such corporations. The officers of a city are drawn from their duties to make answer as much in the one case, as in the other. Yet, we find them constantly called upon to answer suit for debt for damages, caused by the alleged neglect of the city's agent, or to writs of mandamus issued to compel them to perform their duties. To answer to these proceedings and properly defend them, the officers are frequently forced to leave their posts of duty, and to continue in attendance upon court for days, or weeks, if necessary, no matter how inconvenient it may be to the city government to dispense with their services. The policy of keeping the operations of municipal government free from the interference of law suits must yield to the more important policy of securing to the creditors and injured parties, payment of their debts and redress for their wrongs, to be enforced by the appropriate process of the law. It is not the policy of the law that the citizen should be wronged rather than that the city government should suffer inconvenience. Little difference, if any, exists between the inconvenience of answering to an ordinary suit and that of answering to a writ of garnishment. The latter is nothing more than a suit by the plaintiff in the writ against the city, the matter in dispute, if there be any dispute at all, being the alleged indebtedness of the city to the debtor of the plaintiff. It is not required to take part in the controversy between the plaintiff and the party for whose debt it is garnished. It cannot, therefore, be said, that in requiring a city to answer to a writ of garnishment, it is necessarily drawn...