White Brass Castings Co. v. Union Metal Mfg. Co.

• Decision Date: 11 February 1908
• Parties: WHITE BRASS CASTINGS CO. et al. v. UNION METAL MFG. CO. et al.
• Court: Illinois Supreme Court

232 Ill. 165

83 N.E. 540

WHITE BRASS CASTINGS CO. et al.

v.UNION METAL MFG. CO. et al.

Supreme Court of Illinois.

Dec. 17, 1907.

Rehearing Denied Feb. 11, 1908.

Error to Branch Appellate Court, First District, on Appeal from Superior Court, Cook County; W. M. McEwen, Judge.

Bill by the White Brass Castings Company and others against the Union Metal Manufacturing Company and others. From a judgment of the Appellate Court for the First District, affirming a decree dismissing the bill, complainant and others bring error. Writ dismissed.Blum & Blum, for plaintiffs in error.

Simon La Grow and John C. Farwell, for defendants in error.

DUNN, J.

The White Brass Castings Company filed its bill in the superior court of Cook county against the Union Metal Manufacturing Company and others, by which it sought to have canceled a certain agreement between the two corporations so far as it related to the issue of 600 shares of the capital stock of the complainant, and also sought to have said 600 shares canceled unless the holders of the certificates therefor would pay for them. Answers were filed, and, after a reference to the master, a hearing was had upon his report, and a decree was entered dismissing the bill. The complainant appealed, and the Appellate Court for the First District affirmed the decree. The appellant in that court, complainant below, prayed a further appeal to this court, but did not file any bond. Subsequently a writ of error was issued out of this court to the Appellate Court for the First District at the suit of the White Brass Castings Company, John H. Winterburn, and Nicholas E. Murray against the Union Metal Manufacturing Company and others. As a return to that writ there has been filed the record in the case of the White Brass Castings Company against the Union Metal Manufacturing Company and others.

Neither John H. Winterburn nor Nicholas E. Murray was a party to the bill of the White Brass Castings Company against the Union Metal Manufacturing Company and others. They were the owners of 210 of the 1,000 shares of the stock of the complainant, 600 shares of which stock, being the shares in controversy herein, were held by the defendants; the remaining 190 shares never having been issued. On the first day of the last term a motion was made on behalf of the White Brass Castings Company to dismiss the writ of error as to it, and it was made to appear that neither Winterburn and Murray nor their attorneys were authorized by that company to sue out the writ of error. It was inadvertently overlooked that Winterburn and Murray were not parties to the proceedings in the superior court or the Appellate Court, and the motion was overruled on the ground that, having a right to sue out the writ of error themselves, they might join the White Brass Castings Company as plaintiff in error. But the White Brass Castings Company alone had the right to sue out a writ of error. It was the only complainant-the only party against whom the decree and the judgment of affirmance were rendered. Winterburn and Murray could not sue out a writ of error in their own names, and they could not, without the authority of the White Brass Castings Company, use its name for that...