Harold Petri v. Creelman Lumber Company

• Citation: 50 L.Ed. 281,199 U.S. 487,26 S.Ct. 133
• Decision Date: 04 December 1905
• Docket Number: No. 49,49
• Parties: HAROLD PETRI, Carl Bopp, and Victor Poels, Copartners, Doing Business under the Name of Petri & Company, Plffs. in Err., v. F. E. CREELMAN LUMBER COMPANY and Frank E. Creelman
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

199 U.S. 487

26 S.Ct. 133

50 L.Ed. 281

HAROLD PETRI, Carl Bopp, and Victor Poels, Copartners, Doing Business under the Name of Petri & Company, Plffs. in Err.,

v F. E. CREELMAN LUMBER COMPANY and Frank E. Creelman.

No. 49.

Argued and submitted November 7, 1905.

Decided December 4, 1905.

Plaintiffs in error, suing as aliens and residents of Antwerp, Belgium, commenced this action in the circuit court of the United States for the northern division of the northern district of Illinois, to recover damages for an alleged libel. Two Illinois corporations and a number of persons were made defendants. The bill as to the corporations alleged citizenship in Illinois, and, as to all the defendants, except the Creelman Lumber Company and F. E. Creelman, one of the individual defendants, the bill alleged that the defendants resided in the district and division where the suit was brought. The Creelman Lumber Company and F. E. Creelman filed pleas to the jurisdiction of the court, based upon the fact that each of them, before and at the time of the commencement of the suit, although citizens of the state of Illinois, were residents of a different district from the one in which the suit was brough,—the is, the southern district of Illinois. To these pleas the plaintiffs demurred, and, on a hearing, a district judge, holding the circuit court, overruled the demurrers, and held the pleas to the jurisdiction good. The plaintiffs electing to stand upon their demurrers to the pleas, the action as to the defendants in question was dismissed for want of jurisdiction. Some time afterwards a bill of exceptions was signed by a circuit judge, in which was recited the action taken by the trial court upon the demurrer to the jurisdictional pleas aforesaid, and the cause was taken to the crcuit court of appeals. That court, however, dismissed the writ of error, and on the receipt of its mandate, about a year after the entry of the judgment of dismissal above referred to, there was filed in the trial court a certificate of te circuit judge, in which was set out the proceedings had in the cause, and it was certified, for the purpose of a writ of error from this court, that the only question involved in such writ of error was one of jurisdiction. It was also certified that the judge who had heard the cause resided in the southern district of Illinois, and was not within the territorial limits of the northern district of Illinois. Cotemporaneous with the filing of the certificate a writ of error was allowed, and in the petition and assignments of errors it clearly appeared that the writ of error was prosecuted solely upon the question of jurisdiction arising trom overruling of the demurrers to the pleas to the jurisdiction.

Mr. Consider H. Willett for plaintiffs in error.

[Argument of Counsel from pages 489-491 intentionally omitted] Messrs. David S. Lansden, John M. Lansden, Angus Leek, and M. Paul Noyes for defendants in error.

Statement by Mr. Justice White:

Mr. Justice White, after making the foregoing statement, delivered the opinion of the court:

A motion to dismiss the writ of error first requires our attention. It is urged that the writ should be dismissed because the bill of exceptions filed below and the certificate made as to the question of jurisdiction on this writ of error were authenticated by a judge other than the trial judge, and further, because the certificate was not made at the term in which the judgment complained of was entered. We are relieved, however, from the necessity of considering these objections, for the reason that the judgment of dismissal and the prior proceedings clearly exhibit the ground upon which the judgment was based, and plainly make apparent on the record the fact that the only matter tried and decided in the circuit court were demurrers to pleas to the jurisdiction, and that the petition upon which the writ of error was allowed asked only for the review of the judgment, which decided that the court had no jurisdiction of the action. This being the state of the record, no bill of exceptions or formal certificate in respect to the matter decided was required, and the question of jurisdiction alone was sufficiently certified to this court, as required by the act of March 3, 1891. 26 Stat. at L. 827, chap. 517, § 5, U. S. Comp. Stat. 1901, p. 549; Interior Constr. & Inprov. Co. v. Gibney, 160 U. S. 217, 40 L. ed. 401, 16 Sup. Ct. Rep. 272, and cases cited; Chappell v. United States, 160 U. S. 507, 40 L. ed. 512, 16 Sup. Ct. Rep. 397.

We pass, then, to a consideration of the merits. The plaintiffs in error insist that the circuit court for the northern division of the northern district of Illinois had jurisdiction over the defendants, who, being citizens of Illinois, were residents of the southern district of that state, because such jurisdiction was expressly conferred by § 740, Rev. Stat., U. S. Comp. Stat. 1901, p. 587, and by the terms of a special act relating to the judicial districts in Illinois, approved March 2, 1887. 24 Stat. at L. 442, chap. 315, U. S. Comp. Stat. 1901, p. 345. On the contrary, in effect, the defendants in error maintain that the court below rightly held that it had no jurisdiction over the defendants who resided in the southern district of Illinois, because § 740 of the Revised Statutes had been repealed by the judiciary acts of March 3, 1875 (18 Stat. at L. 470, chap. 137), and March 3, 1887 (24 Stat. at L. 552, chap. 373), as corrected by the act of August 13, 1888 (25 Stat. at L. 433, chap. 866, U. S. Comp. Stat. 1901, p. 508), and because no such jurisdiction was given by the special act of March 2, 1887, and, if it was conferred by that act, the act was repealed by the judiciary act of March 3, 1887.

In order, as far as may be, to narrow the question for decision to the case before us, we shall come first to consider the contentions concerning jurisdiction, based on the special act of March 2, 1887, which deals alone with the state of Illinois, since, if we conclude that that act gave the jurisdiction and has not been repealed, we will be relieved of the necessity of determining whether the general provision (Rev. Stat. § 740, U. S. Comp. Stat. 1901, p. 587), applicable to all states having more than one judicial district, is yet in force.

In approaching the consideration of the special act relating to the Illinois districts we shall assume, for the purposes of such consideration, that the provisions of § 740, Rev. Stat., were repealed by any or all of the judiciary acts of March 3, 1875, and the act of March 3, 1887, as corrected by the act of August 13, 1888.

In coming to consider the special act two questions arise: 1. Did the terms of that act give jurisdiction to the circuit courts of the United States in Illinois as to all the defendants in a civil action where there were two or more such defendants residing in different districts of the state? 2. If the act conferred such jurisdiction, was it repealed at the time of the bringing of the action?

First. The special act of March 2, 1887, was entitled 'An Act to Amend Section 536 of the Revised Statutes of the United States [U. S. Comp. Stat. 1901, p. 344], Relating to the Division of the State of Illinois into Judicial Districts. . . .' At the time of the passage of this special act there were two judicial districts in the state of Illinois,—the northern and the southern. The 1st section of the act took certain counties from the southern district, and added them to the northern district. The 2d section divided the northern district, as enlarged, into two divisions. The 3d section fixed the place and times of holding courts in said divisions of the northern district. The 4th section, relating to jurisdiction, was as follows:

'Sec. 4. That all civil suits not of a local nature, and criminal prosecutions, must be brought in the division of the said northern district of Illinois where the defendant or defendants reside or the offense is committed; but, if there are two or more defendants in civil suits, residing in the different divisions or districts, the action may be brought in either in which either of the defendants may reside. When the defendant is a nonresident of the district, action may be brought in either division os said district wherein the defendant may be found.' [24 Stat. at L. 442, chap. 315, U. S. Comp. Stat. 1901, p. 345.]

The remaining sections contain provisions rendered necessary by the change in both districts and the subdivision of the northern district.

The first part of the opening sentence of § 4 clearly lays down the general rule controlling suits against residents of the northern district, and directs in what division of that district suit may be brought. This general rule being thus laid down, the sentence proceeds to carve out an exception in the following language: '. . . but if there are two or more defendants in civil suits, residing in different divisions or districts, the action may be brought in either in which either of the defendants may reside.' In other words, the exception plainly confers jurisdiction, in the cases for which it provides, upon the courts of either district, and as to such exception gives the right to bring the suit in either district, and, if brought in the northern district, requires it to be brought in the division of that district in which one of the defendants resided. The text making this provision is free from ambiguity, and, if its plain import be followed, is decisive. But the argument is that the words 'or district,' contained in the sentence, were manifestly a mistake, and should be read 'of the district,' so as to cause the sentence to read as follows: but if there are two or more defendants in civil suits, residing in the different divisions of the district, the action may be brought in either in which either of the defendants may reside. To adopt this view, however, would compel us to strike out the word 'or' and insert in its...