Kneeland v. Luce

• Decision Date: 02 November 1891
• Parties: KNEELAND v. LUCE et al
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

141 U.S. 437

12 S.Ct. 39

35 L.Ed. 808

KNEELAND v. LUCE et al.

November 2, 1891.

R. G. Ingersoll and J. M. Butler, for appellant.

Charles Pratt, for appellees.

BREWER, J.

This is an appeal from a decree in favor of Newton and Luce, as interveners in the foreclosure case of Central Trust Company of New York and others v. Toledo, Delphos & Burlington Railroad Company and others, entered in the circuit court of the United States for the district of Indiana; Kneeland, the already taken and filed in a foreclosure appellant, being the purchaser at the foreclosure sale. The facts disclosed by the record, and by this record the case must be determined, are these: The foreclosure decree was entered on November 12, 1885. On January 8, 1886, interveners filed in the office of the clerk of the circuit court their claim, in the shape of a decree entered December 12, 1885, by the circuit court of the United States for the northern district of Ohio, in a case entitled Central Trust Company of New York and others v. Toledo, Delphos & Burlington Railroad Company and others, which decree finds that there is due to interveners the sum of eight thousand and twenty-eight dollars and ninety-six cents, for lands sold to the railroad company, and which amount thus found to be due is a lien upon the property mortgaged by the railroad company prior to that mortgage. This claim, with many others, was referred to masters, who reported in favor of its allowance and priority, which report was approved by the court, and a decree entered accordingly, from which decree this appeal has been taken. It appears from the statements of counsel, and impliedly from the record, that the principal foreclosure proceedings were had in the Indiana court, but that ancillary proceedings were had in the circuit court of the United States for the northern district of Ohio, and in these ancillary proceedings the decree of December 12, 1885, was entered.

Without noticing other questions which were discussed by counsel, it is enough to say that this record is too meager for us to determine whether there was any error in this decree. The testimony taken before the masters is not preserved, nor do we find even the final report of the masters made March 10, 1887, and upon which the decree was entered. While two prior reports of the masters, made separately, are partially preserved in the record, yet in them is simply a reference to the claim of interveners, and a statement that it is based upon the decree rendered in the Ohio court. As the final report is omitted, we know not what showing of facts it contained; and as the testimony presented to the masters for consideration, and afterwards to the court, is not preserved, how can it be adjudged that there was any error in the decree? So far as respects the decree of December 12, 1885, in the Ohio court, it discloses a prima facie claim, at least, in the favor of the interveners; for, while it finds that no deed or deeds had...