The proviso in § 6 of the Act of March 3, 1887, 24 Stat. 552, c.
373, concerning the jurisdiction over suits which had been removed
from a state court prior to the passage of the act, relates only to
the jurisdiction of circuit court of the United States, and does
not confer upon this Court jurisdiction over an appeal from a
judgment remanding a cause to a state court; but such jurisdiction
was expressly taken away by the last paragraph of § 2 of the act,
taken in connection with the repeal of § 5 of the Act of March 3,
1875, 18 Stat. 470.
This was a motion to dismiss, united with a motion to affirm.
The case is stated in the opinion of the court.
Page 123 U. S. 287
MR. CHIEF JUSTICE WAITE delivered the opinion of the Court.
This is a writ of error for the review of an order of the
circuit court remanding a suit which had been removed from the
Supreme Court of the State of Nebraska. The suit was for a mandamus
to compel Wilkinson, the Treasurer of Dakota County, to apply
certain moneys in his hands, collected for that purpose, to the
payment of past-due coupons detached from bonds issued by the
county. It was begun February 14, 1887. The defendants answered
March 1, 1887, denying the validity of the bonds, and at the same
time they presented their petition for the removal of the suit to
the Circuit Court of the United States for the District of Nebraska
on the ground that the relator was a citizen of Ohio, and they were
citizens of Nebraska. The state court directed the removal April 6,
1887, and a copy of the record was entered in the circuit court on
the 19th of the same month. On the 27th of May, the relator moved
to remand the suit, "on the ground that the circuit court was
without jurisdiction to review the said cause, and to hear and
determine the same." This motion was granted the same day, and
thereupon the present writ of error was sued out by the defendants,
which the relator now moves to dismiss for want of
jurisdiction.
We have already decided at the present term, in
Morey v.
Lockhart, ante, 123 U. S. 56, that
since the Act of March 3, 1887, c. 373, 24 Stat. 552, no appeal or
writ of error lies to this Court under the last paragraph of § 5 of
the Act of March 3, 1875, from an order of the circuit court
remanding a suit which had been removed from a state court. That,
however, was a case in which the suit was begun, and the removal
had, after the act of 1887 went into effect. Here the suit was
begun and a petition for removal filed in the state court before
the act, and this, it is contended, saves to these parties their
right to a writ of error under the act of 1875, because of a
proviso in § 6 of that of 1887, in these words:
"Provided that this act shall not affect the jurisdiction over
or disposition of any suit removed from the court of any state, or
suit commenced in any court of the United States, before
Page 123 U. S. 288
the passage hereof except as otherwise expressly provided in
this act."
This, in our opinion, relates only to the jurisdiction of the
circuit court and the disposition of the suit on its merits, and
has no reference to the jurisdiction of this Court under the act of
1875 for the review, by appeal or writ of error, of an order of the
circuit court remanding the cause. That was "expressly provided"
for in the last paragraph of § 2 of the act of 1887, in which it
was enacted that
"Whenever any cause shall be removed from any state court into
any circuit court of the United States, and the circuit court shall
decide that the cause was improperly removed, and order the same to
be remanded to the state court from whence it came, such remand
shall be immediately carried into execution, and no appeal or writ
of error from the decision of the circuit court so remanding such
cause shall be allowed."
This provision, when taken in connection with the repeal by § 6
of the last paragraph of § 5 of the act of 1875, shows unmistakably
an intention on the part of Congress to take away all appeals and
writs of error to this Court from orders thereafter made by circuit
courts remanding suits which had been removed from a state court,
and this whether the suit was begun and the removal had, before or
after the act of 1887.
The motion to dismiss is granted.