Lamb v. Schmitt

• Decision Date: 14 March 1932
• Docket Number: No. 433,433
• Citation: 285 U.S. 222,76 L.Ed. 720,52 S.Ct. 317
• Parties: LAMB v. SCHMITT
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

285 U.S. 222

52 S.Ct. 317

76 L.Ed. 720

LAMB

v SCHMITT.

No. 433.

Argued Feb. 17, 1932.

Decided March 14, 1932.

Messrs. Edward B. Burling, of Washington, D. C., Arvid B. Tanner, of Chicago, Ill., and W. Calvin Wells, of Jackson, Miss., for petitioner.

[Argument of Counsel from pages 223-224 intentionally omitted] Mr. Gerald FitzGerald and Sam C. Cook, both of Clarksdale, Miss., for respondent.

Mr. Justice STONE delivered the opinion of the Court.

This case is here on certiorari, 284 U. S. 609, 52 S. Ct. 43, 76 L. Ed. —, to review a decree of the Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, 48 F.(2d) 533, reversing an order of the District Court for Northern Mississippi, which quashed service of process upon the petitioner, Lamb. The suit is a companion to Lamb v. Cramer, 285 U. S. 217, 52 S. Ct. 315, 76 L. Ed. —, decided this day, and, like it, is ancillary to the principal suit referred to in that case, which was brought to set aside conveyances of land and dispositions of money and personal property as in fraud of judgment creditors.

The present suit was brought by the respondent here, the receiver appointed by the decree in the first one. In seeks the recovery of a part of the funds involved in the first suit, paid, pendente lite, as fees to Lamb, who acted as attorney of one of the defendants in that suit. The petitioner, a resident of Illinois, was served with process while he was in the Northern District of Mississippi in attendance on the court as an attorney in the principal suit. The sole question presented is whether the court below rightly held that the petitioner, in the circumstances stated, was not immune from service of process. The general rule that witnesses, suitors, and their attorneys, while in attendance in connection with the conduct of one suit, are immune from service of process in another, is founded, not upon the convenience of the individuals, but of the court itself. Page Co. v. Macdonald, 261 U. S. 446, 43 S. Ct. 416, 67 L. Ed. 737; Stewart v. Ramsay, 242 U. S. 128, 130, 37 S. Ct. 44, 61 L. Ed. 192; Hale v. Wharton (C. C.) 73 F. 739; Diamond v. Earle, 217 Mass. 499, 501, 105 N. E. 363, 51 L. R. A. (N. S.) 1178, Ann. Cas. 1915D, 984; Parker v. Marco, 136 N. Y. 585, 32 N. E. 989, 20 L. R. A. 45, 32 Am. St. Rep. 770. As commonly stated and applied, it proceeds upon the ground that the due administration of justice requires that a court shall not permit interference with the progress of a cause pending before it, by the service of process in other suits, which would prevent, or the fear of which might tend to discourage, the voluntary attendance of those whose presence is necessary or convenient to the judicial administration in the pending litigation. See Bridges v. Sheldon (C. C.) 7 F. 17, 43 et seq. In Stewart v. Ramsay, the court said at page 130, of 242 U. S., 37 S. Ct. 44, 46, quoting from Parker v. Hotchkiss, Fed. Cas. No. 10,739: 'The privilege which is asserted here is the privilege of the court, rather than of the defendant. It is founded in the necessities of the judicial administration, which would be often embarrassed, and sometimes interrupted, if the suitor might be vexed with process while attending upon the court for the protection of his rights, or the witness while attending to testify.'

It follows that the privilege should not be enlarged beyond the reason upon which it is founded, and that it should be extended or withheld only as judicial necessities require. See Brooks v. State, 3 Boyce (Del.) 1, 79 A. 790, 51 L. R. A. (N. S.) 1126, Ann. Cas. 1915A, 1133; Netograph Co. v. Scrugham, 197 N. Y. 377, 90 N. E. 962, 27 L. R. A. (N. S.) 333, 134 Am. St. Rep. 886; Nichols v. Horton ( C. C.) 14 F. 327; Iron Dyke Copper Min. Co. v. Iron Dyke R. Co. (C. C.) 132 F. 208. Limitations of it on this basis have been not infrequently made because the attendance upon the trial of a cause, however vital to the personal interests of those concerned, was not for the purpose of facilitating the progress of the cause, see Brooks v. State, supra; Vaughn v. Boyd, 142 Ga. 230, 82 S. E. 576, L. R. A. 1915A, 694; Sampson v. Graves, 208 App. Div. 522, 526, 203 N. Y. S. 729; or because the service was made on one whose attendance was not voluntary, and hence had no tendency to interfere with judicial administration, Netograph Mfg. Co. v. Scrugham, supra.

The question presented here is of a somewhat different character: Whether, despite any effect of the immunity in encouraging voluntary attendance at the trial, it should be withheld from one who, while in attendance, is served with process commanding his continued presence and aid to facilitate the pending litigation, and to carry it to its final conclusion?

It has never been doubted that witnesses, parties, and their counsel are amenable to the process or order of the court for contempt of court, committed while in attendance upon the trial, or that any of them, while there, are subject to the process and orders of the court to compel the production of documents or their testimony in the cause. Nor can it be doubted that the petitioner here, notwithstanding his presence as an attorney and officer...