Title Guaranty Surety Company of Scranton v. State of Idaho Allen

• Decision Date: 21 February 1916
• Docket Number: No. 815,815
• Citation: 36 S.Ct. 345,240 U.S. 136,60 L.Ed. 566
• Parties: TITLE GUARANTY & SURETY COMPANY OF SCRANTON, Pennsylvania, a Corporation, and Vernon W. Platt, Plffs. in Err., v. STATE OF IDAHO to and for Use and Benefit of O. W. ALLEN et al
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

240 U.S. 136

36 S.Ct. 345

60 L.Ed. 566

TITLE GUARANTY & SURETY COMPANY OF SCRANTON, Pennsylvania, a Corporation, and Vernon W. Platt, Plffs. in Err.,

v STATE OF IDAHO to and for Use and Benefit of O. W. ALLEN et al.

No. 815.

Submitted January 24, 1916.

Decided February 21, 1916.

Messrs. Samuel H. Hays, John F. Nugent, and Pasco B. Carter for plaintiffs in error.

Mr. Joseph H. Peterson, Attorney General of Idaho, and Messrs. Paris Martin and William E. Cameron for defendants in error.

[Argument of Counsel from pages 137-138 intentionally omitted] Mr. Chief Justice White delivered the opinion of the court:

The case is before us on a motion to dismiss or affirm. The action of the court below which it is sought to review affirmed a judgment of the trial court entered on the verdict of a jury in a suit brought by the state for the use and benefit of O. W. Allen and two hundred and eighteen other named depositors of the Boise State Bank against Platt, a state bank commissioner, and the surety on his bond, for losses alleged to have been suffered by each of the individuals named as the result of alleged neglect of official duty imposed by the state law upon the bank commissioner. The wrong relied upon was his alleged misconduct in not closing the doors of the bank, and permitting it to continue business after he had discovered, as the result of an official examination, that the bank was hopelessly insolvent. The bill as a first cause of action fully set out the facts and stated the legal grounds relied upon to establish the loss and right of O. W. Allen to recover, and separate causes of action were then stated in favor of each of the two hundred and eighteen other depositors. There was an application to remove the case to the district court of the United States on the ground of diverse citizenship, the depositors named being citizens of Idaho, and Platt, the bank commissioner, being then a resident of California, and the Surety Company of Pennsylvania, which application was denied. After issue joined there was a trial before a jury and a verdict in favor of the plaintiff, the state, and against the defendants, 'on each and every cause of action set forth in the complaint herein, to and for the use and benefit of each of the parties named in each of the separate causes of action set forth in plaintiff's complaint.' And it was conformably adjudged 'that the said plaintiff do have and recover of and from the said defendants . . . for the use and benefit of each of the following-named parties, the sums set opposite their respective names, to wit,' etc. No one of the amounts thus awarded to the plaintiff for the use of any one of the named persons equalled $3,000, but the sum of all the claims equalled $30,000. In affirming the judgment the court below held that the relief prayed was authorized by the state statutes, and that they also conferred authority upon the state to bring the suit as an express trustee for the use and benefit of the respective parties.

The Federal questions relied upon are, first, the alleged wrongful denial of the right to remove, and second, an asserted error committed by the court below in refusing to sustain a claim under the due process clause of the 14th Amendment.

The first is plainly without merit. Treating the state as the party plaintiff, it is not open to question that there was no right to remove. Stone v. South Carolina, 117 U. S. 430, 29 L. ed. 962, 6 Sup. Ct. Rep. 799; Missouri, K. & T. R. Co. v. Missouri R. & W. Comrs. (Missouri, K. & T. R. Co. v. Hickman) ...