Corbett v. Craven

• Decision Date: 16 October 1906
• Citation: 78 N.E. 748,193 Mass. 30
• Parties: CORBETT v. CRAVEN.
• Court: United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court

193 Mass. 30

78 N.E. 748

CORBETT v. CRAVEN.

Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, Hampden.

October 16, 1906

COUNSEL

C. T. Callahan, for plaintiff.

Chas H. Beckwith, for defendant.

OPINION

KNOWLTON C.J.

This is a suit for the conversion of certain machinery. The question presented by the bill of exceptions is whether the plaintiff is barred by a former decree for the defendant in a suit in equity. This suit was brought by the person from whom the present plaintiff took his title pendente lite, and the decree is binding not only upon the parties to it, but upon their privies. There is no dispute that the present plaintiff is affected by it as the plaintiff in that suit would have been if he had not parted with his title. Sawyer v. Woodbury, 7 Gray, 499-502, 66 Am. Dec 518; Borrowscale v. Tuttle, 5 Allen, 377; Haven v. Adams, 8 Allen, 363. The decree was 'Bill dismissed,' which is a final decree upon the merits, that settles forever all matters involved in the suit. Snell v. Dwight, 121 Mass. 348; Foote v. Gibbs, 1 Gray, 412.

If the question were, 'What is the effect of the judgment in a collateral proceeding?' the case would be different, and the answer would be, 'Only to settle such matters as were actually tried and adjudicated.' But as a final disposition of the case, a judgment on the merits includes everything that was litigated, or that might have been litigated, in the case brought by the plaintiff before the court. Foye v. Patch, 132 Mass. 105-110; Watts v. Levine, 182 Mass. 407, 65 N.E. 479, 32 L. R. A. 187, 39 Am. St. Rep. 509; Butrick, Petitioner, 185 Mass. 107-113, 69 N.E. 1044. There is nothing in the decision in Waterhouse v. Levine, 182 Mass. 407, 65 N.E. 822, adverse to this view, although some of the language in the opinion is broader than the case called for. The cause of action in that suit was not the same as that to which the judgment in the former action related, but it came into existence after the former suit was brought. Although the two suits related to the same transaction, it was competent to show that the last was for a cause of action which had lately arisen, and which could not be affected by a judgment founded on different conditions existing previously.

We are therefore, brought to the question which has been most discussed, namely, whether the suit in equity included the present cause of action. The plaintiff in equity was the trustee of one Connor, a bankrupt, and he averred in the third clause of his bill 'that the said bankrupt owns and has located, in the brick building at No. 649 Main street in said Holyoke called the New York Mills, all the machinery, tools and manufacturing implements located in said mills, and all machinery in the mills situated at the corner of Cabot and Bigelow streets in said Holyoke, called the Bigelow Street Mills of the Holyoke Water Power Company, of great value, and all of which property is claimed to by owned by Michael Craven of Springfield in said county.' Then followed an exception of certain machinery which is immaterial to this case. The present suit is to recover for a conversion of a part of the machinery in these mills. In the fourth clause, after an averment in regard to the purchase 'of all of the above described personal property' by the bankrupt, he charged, 'that later, in the years 1883, 1885 and 1891, Michael Craven claims...