Mitchell v. Elliott

• Decision Date: 31 January 1873
• Citation: 49 Ga. 125
• Court: Georgia Supreme Court
• Parties: DANIEL R. MITCHELL, plaintiff in error. v. COTHRANS & ELLIOTT, defendants in error.

49 Ga. 125

DANIEL R. MITCHELL, plaintiff in error. v. COTHRANS & ELLIOTT, defendants in error.

Supreme Court of the State of Georgia

(Atlanta, January Term, 1873.)

Constitutional law. Relief Act of 1870. Before Judge Harvey. Floyd Superior Court. January Adjourned Term, 1872.

Daniel R. Mitchell brought complaint against Cothrans & Elliott on a promissory note, dated February 8th, 1861, due one day after the date thereof, for $8,000 00, besides interest.

Various pleas were filed by the defendants unnecessary to be here set forth. The whole case was submitted to the jury, including the question whether the taxes on the debt had been paid, as required by the provisions of the Act of October 13, 1870. The jury returned a verdict finding that the taxes had not been paid. Whereupon, the Court dismissed the case, and the plaintiff excepted.

Warren Akin, for plaintiff in error.

Smith & Branham; Underwood & Rowell, for defendants.

TRIPPE, Judge.

An issue was made and submitted to a jury, under the Act of October 13th, 1870, whether the taxes on the debt sued for has been paid by the plaintiff. The verdict was that the taxes had not been paid. The Court dismissed the case, and plaintiff excepted. In the case of Walker v. Whitehead, taken from this Court by writ of error to the Supreme Court of the United States, that Court decided at its last term thatthe Act of October 13th, 1870, was in violation of that provision *of the Constitution of the United States which prohibits a State from passing any law impairing the obligation of contracts. I consider this decision as fully settling the much discussed question of the constitutionality of this Act. That was the only point made in the case of Walker v. Whitehead. The case arose in one of the Superior Courts of this State. The defendant moved the Court to dismiss it because no affidavit of the payment of taxes had been filed. The motion was granted. That decision was affirmedby this Court, and by writ of error taken to the Supreme Court of the United States, and the decision thereon made as above stated. In the certified report of that decision the Court quotes all that portion of the Act touching the question, and say "a clearer case of a law impairing the obligation of a contract, within the meaning of the Constitution, can hardly occur."

When a question has been decided by a tribunal with authority to determine it, it is unnecessary to discuss the reasons for or against the decision. The Act being then unconstitutional, the verdict of the jury finding that the taxes on the claim had not been paid, was a verdict on an immaterial issue, and was no ground for the judgment of the Court below dismissing the suit.

Judgment reversed.

WARNER, Chief Justice, concurring.

In my judgment, the Act of the General Assembly of the 13th of October, 1870, denying to the plaintiff the aid of the Courts to collect his debt until the taxes thereon had been duly paid for each year, as required by the terms and provisions thereof, is unconstitutional and void for the reasons expressed in my dissenting opinions in the cases of Walker v. Whitehead, 43 Georgia Reports, 553; Allison, Anderson & Company v. Graham, 45 Georgia Reports, 355, and in my concurring opinion in Lott v. Dysart, 45 Georgia Reports, 358. The case of Walker v. Whitehead was taken up from this Court by writ of error to the Supreme Court of the United States, and has been recently decided by the unanimous judgment *of that Court. In delivering its judgment as to the validity of the Act of 13th October, 1870, the Court say that "a clearer case of impairing the obligation of a contract, within the meaning of the Constitution, can hardly occur." In the case of Walker v. Whitehead, the question was distinctly made before this Court that the Act of 13th October, 1870, was void because it impaired the obligation of the contract in violation of the Constitution of the United States. The majority of this Court held, and decided, that the Act was a constitutional law, and did no-impair the obligation of contracts as prohibited by the Cont stitution of the United States. That question was distinctly made in the record before this Court, and, as a matter of course, was as distinctly made in that same record when it was taken up to the Supreme Court of the United States by writ of error for review and adjudication there: See Walker v. Whitehead, 43 Georgia Reports, 538. If the judgment of the Supreme Court of the United States had been in favor of the constitutionality of the law, the decision of that tribunal would have been an authoritative and binding decision upon the question involved, and I should unhesitatingly have acquiesced in it, because it would have been my plain dutyas a judicial officer of the State, sworn to support the Constitution of the United States, to have done so.

But as the appellate tribunal has, in the exercise of its appropriate jurisdiction, declared the law in question unconsitutional and void, it is equally authoritative and binding upon the Courts of this State. And such was the opinion and judgment of this Court in Mosely v. Hogg, 45 Georgia Reports, 599. After the Supreme Court of the United States had decided the question in the case of White v. Hart, taken up from this Court, that the clause of the Constitution of 1868, which denied to the Courts of this State jurisdiction or authority to give judgment on or enforce any debt the consideration of which was a slave or slaves, or the hire thereof, was in violation of the Constitution of the United States, and, therefore, void, the case of Mosely v. Hogg came before *this Court in a suit on a note given for the hire of a slave. In concurring in the judgment of the Court in that case, my brother, McCay, properly said: "I concur in the judgment of reversal on the sole ground that the Supreme Court of the United States having decided in the case of White v. Hart that the 17th section, Article V., of the Constitution of 1868 is void, this Court is bound to conform its judgment to the decision and judgment of the appellate tribunal having jurisdiction of the question." In the case of Walker v. Whitehead, the Supreme Court of the United States had the same jurisdiction of the question whether the Act of 13th October, 1870, was a valid constitutional law or not, as it had of the question in White v. Hart, whether the 17th section of Article V. of the Constitution of 1858 was a valid or void law, and having decided the question that the Act of 13th of October, 1870, is an unconstitutional and void law, this Court is as much bound to conform its judgment to the decision and judgment of the appellate tribunal having jurisdiction of the question in that case, as it was in the case of White v. Hart. If not, why not, is the question to be answered. The question involved in both cases for the decision of the appellate tribunal was the constitutionality or unconstitutionality of State law according to the provisions of the Constitution of the United States. The question decided in Walker v. Whitehead by the Supreme Court of the United States was, that the Act of the 13th of October, 1870, is an unconstitutional void law, and, consequently, does not affect or control the legal rights of anybody, either in this or any other Court. I am, therefore, of the opinion that the judgment of the Court below should be reversed.

McCAY, Judge, dissenting.

After much reflection as to my duty in these cases, I feel constrained to dissent from the judgment of the Court. I do not think the decision of the Supreme Court of the United States in the case of Walker v. Whitehead, controls or should control any other case than that in which it was pronounced.

*As a general rule, it is the duty of a Court, from whose judgments there is an appeal, to conform to what it has good reason to know will be the judgment of the appellate tribunal. It is also generally true, that a judgment in a similar case is good evidence of what will be the holding in ...