Hooe v. Jamieson

• Decision Date: 05 April 1897
• Docket Number: No. 374,374
• Citation: 41 L.Ed. 1049,166 U.S. 395,17 S.Ct. 596
• Parties: HOOE et al. v. JAMIESON et al
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

166 U.S. 395

17 S.Ct. 596

41 L.Ed. 1049

HOOE et al.

v JAMIESON et al.

No. 374.

April 5, 1897.

A. R. Bushnell, for plaintiffs in error.

S. S. Barney, for defendants in error.

Mr. Chief Justice FULLER delivered the opinion of the court.

This was an action of ejectment, brought in the circuit court of the United States for the Western district of Wisconsin, by the complaint in which plaintiffs in error alleged that they resided in and were citizens of the city of Washington, D. C., and that defendants all resided in and were citizens of the state of Wisconsin. Defendants moved to dismiss the action on the ground that the circuit court had no jurisdiction, as the controversy was not between citizens of different states. The circuit court ordered that the action be dismissed unless plaintiffs within five days thereafter should so amend their complaint as to allege the necessary jurisdictional facts. Plaintiffs then moved for leave to amend their complaint by averring that three of them were, when the suit was commenced, and continued to be, citizens of the District of Columbia, but that one of them was a citizen of the state of Minnesota, and that each was the owner of an undivided one-fourth of the lands and premises described in the complaint, and that they severally claimed damages and demanded judgment. This motion was denied, and the action dismissed. Plaintiffs sued out this writ of error under Act March 3, 1891, c. 517, § 5, and the circuit court certified to this court these questions of jurisdiction:

'First. Whether or not said complaint sets forth any cause of action in which there is a controversy between citizens of different states, so as to give said circuit court jurisdiction thereof.

'Second. Whether or not said complaint, as so proposed to be amended, would, if so amended, set forth any cause of action in which there is a controversy between citizens of different states, so as to give said circuit court jurisdiction thereof.'

The judicial power extends under the constitution to con- troversies between citizens of different states, and the judiciary act of 1789 provided, as does the act of March 3, 1887, as corrected by the act of August 13, 1888 (25 Stat. 433, c. 866), that the circuit courts of the United States should have original cognizance of all suits of a civil nature at common law or in equity in which there should be a controversy between citizens of different states.

We see no reason for arriving at any other conclusion than that announced by Chief justice Marshall in Hepburn v. Ellzey, 2 Cranch, 445 (Feb. term, 1805), 'that the members of the American confederacy only are the states contemplated in the constitution'; that the District of Columbia is not a state within the meaning of that instrument, and that the courts of the United States have no jurisdiction of cases between citizens of the District of Columbia and citizens of a state.

In Strawbridge v. Curtiss, 3 Cranch, 267, it was held that, if there be two or more joint plaintiffs and two or more joint defendants, each of the plaintiffs must be capable of suing each of the defendants in the courts of the United States in order to support the jurisdiction; and in Smith v. Lyon, 133 U. S. 315, 10 Sup. Ct. 303, Strawbridge v. Curtiss was followed, and it was decided that under the acts of 1887 and 1888 the circuit court has not jurisdiction, on the ground of diverse citizenship, if there are...