Des Moines Navigation Co v. Iowa Homestead Co

• Decision Date: 05 December 1887
• Citation: 8 S.Ct. 217,123 U.S. 552,31 L.Ed. 202
• Parties: DES MOINES NAVIGATION & R. CO. v. IOWA HOMESTEAD CO. 1
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

8 S.Ct. 217

123 U.S. 552

31 L.Ed. 202

DES MOINES NAVIGATION & R. CO. v. IOWA HOMESTEAD CO.¹

December 5, 1887.

C. H. Gatch and Wm. Connor, for plaintiff in error.

George Crane, for defendant in error.

WAITE, C. J.

This suit was brought by the Iowa Homestead Company against the Des Moines Navigation & Railroad Company to recover the same taxes for the years 1864 to 1871, both inclusive, which formed part of the subject-matter of the litigation between the same parties in Homestead Co. v. Railroad, 17 Wall. 153, referred to in Stryker v. Crane, ante, 203. The railroad company set up the decree in its favor in that suit as a bar to the present action, and to this the homestead company replied 'that the decree or judgment referred to is null and void, for the reason that the courts of the United States had no jurisdiction of said suit, and no legal power or authority to render said decree or judgment.'

Upon this part of the case the facts admitted were substantially the same as are set forth in Stryker v. Crane, ante, 203, with the addition of this stipulation made by the parties, and filed in the circuit court: 'And it is further stipulated that the defendants, Samuel G. Wolcott, Edwin C. Litchfield, Edward Wade, and John Stryker, each and every of whom are citizens of New York, and the Des Moines Navigation & Railroad Company, duly appeared in this court, and filed joint and several answers to complainant's bill, duly verified; that the said answers are not now found with the papers in this cause; that the said answers of said defendants were substantially in all respects like those of the defendants, William B. Welles and Albert Tracy, on file herein, and duly verified by them, respectively, except such changes, variations, and alterations as were necessary to present the interests held by said defendants, respectively, in the land in this action.'

Other defenses were set up in the answer similar to those in Stryker v. Crane, ante, 203; Chapman v. Crane, ante, 203; and Litchfield v. Crane, ante, 210; but it is unnecessary to restate them here. The case was taken to the supreme court of the state on appeal, and among the errors assigned there was this 'The court erred in holding that plaintiff was not estopped from prosecuting this suit by the former adjudication in said former suit of the Iowa Homestead Company against the Des Moines Navigation & Railroad Company and others.'

At the hearing in the supreme court a final decree was entered against the navigation and railroad company for the full amount of taxes paid, and the interest. The opinion of the court, so far as it related to the question of former adjudication, was in these words: 'The question of former adjudication, discussed in the fifth point of the foregoing opinion, is not discussed by counsel for defendant in this case in his printed brief, though it was pleaded as a defense. Counsel for plaintiff in this case filed a printed brief used in the former case, but upon the fifth point it is not at all applicable, for the reason that the facts involved in the pleas of former adjudication are not identical in each case. The two cases were discussed at the oral argument together, all the points involved in each case being considered; but we were left to the printed briefs and abstracts in order to make application of the arguments properly to the separate cases. Since the submission of the cases, counsel for each party has been called upon to express his understanding of the points to be determined in the cases separately. Counsel for defendant claims that the question of prior adjudication, while not presented in his printed brief, was argued orally, and is, therefore, in this case; counsel for plaintiff claims that it is not. Certain is it that it is not made in the printed brief for defendant, and we are unable to say that it was made on the oral argument as applicable to this case. The counsel for defendant having failed to present this point in his brief, he cannot, according to the spirit of our rules, urge it in oral argument. In view of the want of agreement between counsel, we are required to hold that the question of prior adjudication cannot be determined in this case.' Homestead Co. v. Navigation & R. Co., 63 Iowa, 285, 19 N. W. Rep. 231.

The 'foregoing opinion' referred to was that in the case of Litchfield v. Crane, 25 N. W. Rep. 882. The record in that case, taken in connection with that in this, shows that the answer setting up the former adjudication, the reply thereto, and the assignment of errors on this point, were the same in both of the cases. They differed in their facts only in that Mrs. Litchfield was not actually a party to the former suit upon the face of the record, and the navigation and railroad company was.

We cannot look upon the reason given by the court below for not considering the question of prior adjudication as sufficient for avoiding the decision of a controlling federal question fairly presented by the pleadings, proofs, and assignment of errors, and necessarily involved in the determination of the case. That question stood in the very front of the litigation, and, if decided in favor of the navigation and railroad company, ended the whole matter. To give a judgment the other way, without considering it, was simply to ignore one of the most important elements of the case as it stood in the record. There can be no escape from this conclusion.

It seems from the opinion, which, as part of the record, we must take notice of, that this case was argued in connection with that of the administrator of Mrs. Grace H. Litchfield. The defense of prior adjudication was made in both, though the facts in the case of Mrs. Litchfield were different from those in this. Mrs. Litchfield was not an actual party to the suit in which the prior adjudication was had, while the navigation and railroad company was; but the question of the jurisdiction of the court for the determination of the rights of the parties was the same in both. In the oral argument, there being but one for the two cases, this point was raised and discussed, but in the printed briefs it was referred to only in that entitled in the suit of the administrator of Mrs. Litchfield. As it was the defense in this case, and, if sustained, made it unnecessary to consider anything else, we cannot decide that the court was justified in holding that it could not be determined. Such action was, in our opinion, equivalent to a decision against the federal right which was actually set up and claimed, and thus our jurisdiction for the review of the judgment on this question, as well as the others, is complete.

We proceed, then, to consider the only objection which has been made to this defense, and that is the alleged want of jurisdiction in the courts of the United States—both in this court and the circuit court—to entertain and finally dispose of the suit in which the prior...