PART 1. appeals from court to the the same r the val versy, eithe one of $3 XIII. SDICTION OF THE NATIONAL MATE COURTS. unities where there are courts current jurisdiction, there is a being brought into collision with danger, consequently, of unseemly interruptions in the orderly and nistration of justice. In this country of conflict is enhanced by the co-existence courts deriving their being and authority ferent and independent sources; some of them The constitution and laws of their respective and the others from the constitution and laws he United States. Not that there is anything in is relation to vary their correlative obligations Cautiously to abstain from all unnecessary interference with each other; but that, as experience has, to some extent, demonstrated, these obligations may be less sensibly felt or less faithfully observed. It is not my purpose here to attempt to define, more particularly than I have already done, the limits of the concurrent jurisdictions of the national and state courts: but, at the conclusion of this summary view of the jurisdiction of the former, it is proper to advert to a general rule which it has been found necessary, as well in this country as in England, to adopt as a safeguard against judicial conflict. A particular notice of the rule is rendered the more important by an application which has, in one instance, been made of it by the supreme court of the United States, because if the principle adopted by the majority of the court in that instance is to be adhered to, it can hardly fail seriously to impair the efficacy and value of remedies in admiralty, especially in favor of mariners. The rule is this: that between courts of concurrent CHAP. 13. jurisdiction, the court that first obtains possession of the controversy, or of the property in dispute, must be allowed to dispose of it finally without interference or interruption from the co-ordinate court. This well settled rule is equally applicable between courts of equity and courts of common law, and between different courts of common law; and it has repeatedly been asserted and enforced by the supreme court between the national and state courts. This was done in the case of Hagan v. Lucas. A judgment had been obtained in the state court of Alabama, and in virtue of an execution issued thereon, the sheriff had levied on certain slaves as the property of the defendants. Lucas, a third person, claimed the slaves as his property, and under a statute of Alabama, they were delivered to him upon his giving a bond for their forthcoming, if it should be found that they belonged to the defendants. Proceedings were thereupon had in the state court, according to the provisions of the state law, to try the right of property. Pending these proceedings a judgment was obtained in a suit at common law by another creditor against the same defendants in the district court of the United States exercising the powers of a circuit court, and the same slaves were levied on by the marshal under an execution from that court. The state court decided that under these circumstances, the property could not lawfully be taken in execution by the marshal upon process from the district court, and the case having been brought before the supreme court of the United States by writ of error under the twenty-fifth section, the judgment of the state court was affirmed, in obvious accordance with the rule under consideration. 1 10 Peters, 400. PART 1. CHAPTER XIII. OF THE CONCURRENT JURISDICTION OF THE NATIONAL AND STATE COURTS. In political communities where there are courts invested with concurrent jurisdiction, there is a possibility of their being brought into collision with each other, and danger, consequently, of unseemly and mischievous interruptions in the orderly and peaceful administration of justice. In this country the danger of conflict is enhanced by the co-existence of such courts deriving their being and authority from different and independent sources; some of them from the constitution and laws of their respective states, and the others from the constitution and laws of the United States. Not that there is anything in this relation to vary their correlative obligations cautiously to abstain from all unnecessary interference with each other; but that, as experience has, to some extent, demonstrated, these obligations may be less sensibly felt or less faithfully observed. It is not my purpose here to attempt to define, more particularly than I have already done, the limits of the concurrent jurisdictions of the national and state courts: but, at the conclusion of this summary view of the jurisdiction of the former, it is proper to advert to a general rule which it has been found necessary, as well in this country as in England, to adopt as a safeguard against judicial conflict. A particular notice of the rule is rendered the more important by an application which has, in one instance, been made of it by the supreme court of the United States, because if the principle adopted by the majority of the court in that instance is to be adhered to, it can hardly fail seriously to impair the efficacy and value of remedies in admiralty, especially in favor of mariners. The rule is this: that between courts of concurrent CHAP. 13. jurisdiction, the court that first obtains possession of the controversy, or of the property in dispute, must be allowed to dispose of it finally without interference or interruption from the co-ordinate court. This well settled rule is equally applicable between courts of equity and courts of common law, and between different courts of common law; and it has repeatedly been asserted and enforced by the supreme court between the national and state courts. This was done in the case of Hagan v. Lucas.1 A judgment had been obtained in the state court of Alabama, and in virtue of an execution issued thereon, the sheriff had levied on certain slaves as the property of the defendants. Lucas, a third person, claimed the slaves as his property, and under a statute of Alabama, they were delivered to him upon his giving a bond for their forthcoming, if it should be found that they belonged to the defendants. Proceedings were thereupon had in the state court, according to the provisions of the state law, to try the right of property. Pending these proceedings a judgment was obtained in a suit at common law by another creditor against the same defendants in the district court of the United States exercising the powers of a circuit court, and the same slaves were levied on by the marshal under an execution from that court. The state court decided that under these circumstances, the property could not lawfully be taken in execution by the marshal upon process from the district court, and the case having been brought before the supreme court of the United States by writ of error under the twenty-fifth section, the judgment of the state court was affirmed, in obvious accordance with the rule under consideration. 1 10 Peters, 400. PART 1. The rule was again applied in the case of Freeman v. Howe et al.,1 on a writ of error to the supreme court of Massachusetts. The case, as succinctly and clearly stated by Mr. Justice NELSON, in pronouncing the decision of the court, was this: Selden White, of the State of New Hampshire, in 1856, instituted a suit in the circuit court of the United States for the district of Massachusetts against the Vermont and Massachusetts Railroad Company, a corporation under the laws of Massachusetts, to recover certain demands claimed against the defendants. The suit was commenced in the way usual in that state, by process of attachment and summons. Freeman, the marshal and plaintiff in error, to whom the processes were delivered, attached a number of railroad cars, which, according to the practice of the court, were seized and held as a security for the satisfaction of the demand in suit, in case a judgment should be recovered. After seizure, and while the cars were in the custody of the marshal, they were taken out of his possession by the sheriff of the county of Middlesex, under a writ of replevin in favor of Howe and others, citizens of Massachusetts and the defendants in error, issued from a state court. The plaintiffs in the replevin suit were mortgagees of the Vermont and Massachusetts Railroad Company, including the cars in question, in trust for bondholders, to secure the payment of a large sum of money which remained due and unpaid. The defendant, Freeman, in the replevin suit, set up, by way of defense, the authority by which he held the property under the circuit court of the United States, which was overruled by the court below and judgment rendered for the plaintiffs. It was to reverse this judgment of the state court that the writ of error was brought; and the supreme court were unani1 24 Howard, 450. |
