1.
Kern v. Huidekoper, supra, p.
103 U. S. 485,
cited and approved.
2. After the plaintiff removed to the proper circuit court of
the United States a suit in replevin brought in a state court, the
latter proceeded to try it and render judgment for a
retorno
habendo. An action having been thereupon brought in the state
court against him and his sureties on the replevin bond, they filed
their bill in the circuit court, praying that the plaintiff in that
action be enjoined from further prosecuting it.
Held that
the circuit court properly granted the prayer of the bill.
3. The ruling in
French, Trustee v.
Hay, 22 Wall. 250, reaffirmed.
The facts are stated in the opinion of the court.
Page 103 U. S. 495
MR. JUSTICE WOODS delivered the opinion of the Court.
After the recovery of the judgment at law, on June 5, 1878, by
Charles Kern, one of the appellants, in the Circuit Court for the
County of Cook, in the action of replevin mentioned in
Kern v.
Huidekoper, supra, p.
103
U. S. 485, notwithstanding the removal of the said cause
to the Circuit Court of the United States for the Northern District
of Illinois, the writ of
retorno habendo was issued
thereon, which the plaintiffs in the replevin suit refused to obey.
Thereupon, on June 7, 1878, an action of debt upon the replevin
bond given by them was begun in the Circuit Court of Cook County
against Frederick W. Huidekoper, Thomas W. Shannon, and John
Dennison, the principals, and A. B. Meeker and John B. Drake, the
sureties on said bond.
The action was brought in the name of Emil Dietzsch, the
coroner, for the use of Charles Kern, the sheriff, who was
nominally interested only, the real interest in the litigation
being in the judgment and execution creditors, the Bank of North
America and John McCaffrey.
Thereupon Huidekoper, Shannon, and Dennison, on June 10, 1878,
filed the bill in this case in the United States Circuit Court for
the Northern District of Illinois against Dietzsch and Kern, in
which they prayed an injunction to restrain them, their attorneys,
agents, &c., and the execution creditors represented by them,
from prosecuting any suit upon said replevin bond against the
principals or sureties therein
"or in any manner whatever taking any action to enforce any
liability or right upon said pretended judgment of return entered
in said Circuit Court of Cook County or upon the said replevin
bond."
On July 1, 1878, a preliminary injunction was allowed
restraining the defendants below from in any manner prosecuting
said action upon the replevin bond or in any manner enforcing said
judgment of return.
After the filing of this bill the action on the replevin bond in
the state court was dismissed as to all the defendants except John
B. Drake.
On Oct. 20, 1879, the complainants below filed their
supplemental bill, in which they alleged that on Oct. 1, 1879,
on
Page 103 U. S. 496
motion of William J. Hynes, an order was entered in the Circuit
Court for Cook County in the said suit, brought in the name of Emil
Dietzsch on said replevin bond, against complainants and their
sureties, by which the Bank of North America and John McCaffrey
were substituted for Dietzsch as parties plaintiff in said action,
and an amended declaration was filed by them as such plaintiffs,
and a rule was entered against Drake requiring him to plead to such
amended declaration within twenty days.
The supplemental bill charged that the Bank of North America and
John McCaffrey, and Edwin Walker, their attorney, had personal
knowledge of the allowance and issue of said injunction, and that
the judgment in favor of the Bank of North America was the property
of Walker, and that the proceedings in said action of debt were in
violation of the injunction of the court and taken for the purpose
of evading its orders, and prayed that the Bank of North America,
McCaffrey, Walker, and Hynes might be made parties defendant to the
bill, and that the injunction allowed upon the original bill might
be so enlarged as to include the said new defendants.
Thereupon the Bank of North America, McCaffrey, Walker, and
Hynes appeared and filed their demurrer to the original and
supplemental bills, alleging as grounds of demurrer that the court
had no jurisdiction to enjoin proceedings in the Circuit Court of
Cook County, Illinois, as prayed for in said original and
supplemental bills.
The demurrer was overruled. The defendants who demurred,
electing to stand by their demurrer, declined to plead or answer.
Thereupon a decree
pro confesso was taken against them and
a final decree was made against all the defendants by which the
preliminary injunction allowed in the case was made absolute and
perpetual.
That decree is brought here by appeal.
We have already decided in
Kern v. Huidekoper, supra,
that the suit in replevin, instituted by Huidekoper and others
against Kern in the Circuit Court for Cook County, was removable to
the United States circuit court; that by the proceedings for that
purpose it was effectually removed on July 27, 1877, to the federal
court, which after that date alone had jurisdiction
Page 103 U. S. 497
thereof, and that all the subsequent proceedings in the cause in
the state court were absolutely null and void.
Upon this state of facts, the only question for decision is
could the court below enjoin the appellants from proceeding in the
action at law brought by them on the replevin bond in the Circuit
Court for Cook County?
The action on the bond in that court was simply an attempt to
enforce the judgment of that court in the replevin suit, rendered
after its removal to the United States circuit court and after the
state court had lost all jurisdiction over the case. If no judgment
had been rendered in the state court against the plaintiffs in the
suit, no action could have been maintained upon the bond. The bond
took the place of the property seized in replevin, and a judgment
upon it was equivalent to an actual return of the replevied
property. The suit upon the bond was therefore, but an attempt to
enforce a pretended judgment of the state court rendered in a case
over which it had no jurisdiction, but which had been transferred
to and decided by the United States circuit court by a judgment in
favor of the plaintiffs in replevin.
The bill in this case was therefore ancillary to the replevin
suit, and was in substance a proceeding in the federal court to
enforce its own judgment by preventing the defeated party from
wresting the replevied property from the plaintiffs in replevin,
who, by the judgment of the court, were entitled to it, or, what
was in effect the same thing, preventing them from enforcing a bond
for the return of the property to them.
A court of the United States is not prevented from enforcing its
own judgments by the statute which forbids it to grant a writ of
injunction to stay proceedings in a state court. Dietzsch, the
original plaintiff in the action on the replevin bond, represented
the real parties in interest, and he was a party to the action of
replevin, which had been pending, and was finally determined in the
United States circuit court. That court had jurisdiction of his
person, and could enforce its judgment in the replevin suit against
him, or those whom he represented, their agents and attorneys. The
bill in this case was filed for that purpose and that only.
Page 103 U. S. 498
If the bill is not maintainable, the appellees would find
themselves in precisely the same plight as if the judgment of the
United States circuit court in the replevin suit had been against
them, instead of for them. The judgment in their favor would settle
nothing. Instead of terminating the strife between them and their
adversaries, it would leave them under the necessity of engaging in
a new conflict elsewhere. This would be contrary to the plainest
principles of reason and justice.
As the bill in this case is filed for the purpose of giving to
litigants on the law side of the court the substantial fruits of a
judgment rendered in their favor, it is merely auxiliary to the
suit at law, and the court has the right to enforce the judgment
against the party defendant and those whom he represents, no matter
how or when they may attempt to evade it or escape its effect,
unless by a direct proceeding. These views are sustained by the
case of
French, Trustee v.
May, 22 Wall. 250, between which and this case
there is no substantial difference.
We think therefore that the demurrer to the bill was properly
overruled.
Decree affirmed.