1. The jurisdiction of the federal courts in admiralty and
maritime cases is given in general terms by the Constitution, and
the extent of it is to be ascertained by a reasonable and just
construction of the words used when taken in connection with the
whole instrument.
2. No state can enlarge it, nor can an act of Congress or rule
of court make it broader than the judicial power may determine to
be its true limits.
3. Congress may prescribe the forms and mode of proceeding in
the tribunals it establishes to carry this power into
execution.
4. Brief history of the legislation of Congress upon this
subject.
5. Congress has given to this Court the authority to alter and
change the forms and modes of proceeding, and it was under this
authority that the 12th Rule of Admiralty Practice was made in
1844, which permitted a proceeding
in rem wherever the
state law gave a lien.
6. It was by virtue of the same authority that the rule was
changed in 1858, and the privilege denied to a suitor of taking out
process
in rem on the mere ground that state law made his
claim a lien.
7. But the abrogation of the rule of 1844 by that of 1858 does
not imply that the Court had become convinced in the interval that
it wanted jurisdiction in cases to which the former rule applied.
The
Page 66 U. S. 523
abrogation meant merely that various considerations made it
advisable not to permit that particular form of process to be used
by persons who might claim it on the sole ground that the state law
gave them a lien where none was given by the maritime code.
8. The courts could not enlarge or diminish their own
jurisdiction by a rule of practice, but they have power over their
own process and mode of procedure, and it was in the exercise of
this latter power that the rule of 1844 was both made and
repealed.
9. The change in the rule was prospective in its operation, and
does not defeat a suit previously commenced.
10. A lien for supplies is not waived by a materialman who
accepts the notes of the owner for the amount due if it was
understood by the parties that the lien should continue.
William H. Meyer and Edwin R. Wilcox filed their libel in the
district court against the steamer
St. Lawrence, her
engine, tackle, apparel &c., for supplies to the value of
$2,500, payment of which had been demanded and refused. The
libellants averred that the
St. Lawrence had been in the
port of New York ever since the supplies were furnished, and they
had a lien on her by the law of the state. Rev.St., Title viii, Ch.
8. Lewis H. Meyer and Edward Stucken made claim as owners, and
answered to the libel that the supplies were furnished on the
credit of John Graham, and not of the vessel; that the libellants
settled and accounted for them with Graham, took his notes for the
amount agreed on, and discharged the vessel; that the respondents
are
bona fide purchasers of the vessel, in good faith,
without notice of the libellants' claim.
The evidence taken in the cause showed that the supplies were
furnished, the amount and value being ascertained to the
satisfaction of the claimants' proctor. It was proved also that
John Graham was the owner of the vessel at the time, and that he
gave his notes for the amount of the libellants' claim, but it was
expressly stipulated between him and the libellants that their lien
against the vessel should not be discharged or released unless the
notes were paid. The notes were afterwards
Page 66 U. S. 524
surrendered. The claimants purchased the vessel after all these
transactions, and there is no proof that they had any notice of the
libellants' claim against her.
The district court decreed in favor of the libellants, the
decree was affirmed by the circuit court, and the claimants
appealed.
Page 66 U. S. 525
MR. CHIEF JUSTICE TANEY.
This is an appeal from the decree of the Circuit Court for the
Southern District of New York, sitting as a court of admiralty.
The case as presented by the transcript is this:
The appellees in the summer and fall of 1855 were requested by
John Graham, the owner of the steamer
St. Lawrence, who
resided in New York, to make sundry repairs to the vessel and to
furnish materials for that purpose. The steamboat was then lying in
the harbor of New York, which was her home port. The libel states
that at the time these repairs were made and materials found, the
laws of New York gave them a lien for the amount on the vessel, and
they pray that the steamer may be condemned and sold to satisfy
their claim. The application for process against the vessel was
founded upon the 12th Rule of Admiralty Practice, prescribed by
this Court in 1844, 3 How., which authorized this mode of
proceeding where the local law gave a lien upon the vessel for
supplies or repairs in a domestic port. This rule was altered at
December Term, 1858, and process
in rem denied to the
party unless a lien was given by the maritime law. The alteration
took effect on the 1st of May, 1859, 21 How., and the libel in this
case was filed while the former rule was still in force.
There is no question as to the amount due, the proctor for the
claimants having assented to the report of the commissioners. But
the claimants allege in their answer that these materials were
furnished and repairs made upon the personal credit of Graham, and
that the libellants accounted with him, and took his notes for the
amount after the work was done. They allege further that they
afterwards purchased the vessel from Graham in good faith and
without notice of this claim, and insist that as the lien claimed
is not created by the maritime law, but solely by a statute of New
York, it cannot be
Page 66 U. S. 526
enforced in a court of admiralty, because a statute of a state
cannot enlarge the jurisdiction of a court of the United
States.
With reference to the last mentioned objection, it may be proper
to notice it, more particularly as it is founded upon a
misconception of the object and effect of the rules above
mentioned.
The objection is founded upon the assumption that these rules
involve a question as to the extent of the admiralty jurisdiction
granted by the Constitution. And as the Court could not,
consistently with its duty, refuse to exercise a power with which
it was clothed by the Constitution and laws, the appellants insist
that the alteration made by the rule in 1858 must be regarded as an
admission that the Court had fallen into error when it adopted the
rule of 1844, and had exercised a jurisdiction beyond its
legitimate boundary, and if the admiralty court had not the right
to enforce a state lien in a case of this kind, the rule then in
force could not enlarge its jurisdiction nor authorize the decree
of the circuit court which supported and enforced this lien.
The argument would be unanswerable if the alteration related to
jurisdiction, for the court Could not, consistently with its duty,
refuse to exercise a power which the Constitution and law had
clothed it when its aid was invoked by a party who was entitled to
demand it as a matter of right.
But there is a wide difference between the power of the Court
upon a question of jurisdiction and its authority over its mode of
proceeding and process. And the alteration in the rules applies
altogether to the character of the process to be used in certain
cases, and has no relation to the question of jurisdiction.
Judicial power, in all cases of admiralty and maritime
jurisdiction, is delegated by the Constitution to the federal
government in general terms, and courts of this character had then
been established in all commercial and maritime nations, differing,
however, materially in different countries in the powers and duties
confided to them, the extent of the jurisdiction conferred
depending very much upon the character of the government in which
they were created, and this circumstance,
Page 66 U. S. 527
with the general terms of the grant, rendered it difficult to
define the exact limits of its power in the United States.
This difficulty was increased by the complex character of our
government, where separate and distinct specified powers of
sovereignty are exercised by the United States and a state
independently of each other within the same territorial limits. And
the reports of the decisions of this Court will show that the
subject has often been before it and carefully considered without
being able to fix with precision its definite boundaries; but
certainly no state law can enlarge it, nor can an act of Congress
or rule of court make it broader than the judicial power may
determine to be its true limits. And this boundary is to be
ascertained by a reasonable and just construction of the words used
in the Constitution, taken in connection with the whole instrument,
and the purposes for which admiralty and maritime jurisdiction was
granted to the federal government.
Yet Congress may undoubtedly prescribe the forms and mode of
proceeding in the judicial tribunals it establishes to carry this
power into execution, and may authorize the court to proceed by an
attachment against the property, or by the arrest of the person as
the legislature shall deem most expedient to promote the purposes
of justice.
A brief history of the legislation of Congress upon this subject
will explain the grounds upon which the rule of 1844 was adopted
and also the reason that induced the court to change it, and will
also show that no question of jurisdiction was supposed to be
involved in the adoption of the original rule nor in the change
that was afterwards made.
After the passage of the Judiciary Act of 1789, Congress, at the
same session, passed the act prescribing the process to be used in
the different courts it had just established, 1 Stat. 93, and by
that act directed that in the courts of admiralty and maritime
jurisdiction, the forms and modes of proceeding should be according
to the course of the civil law.
This act left no discretionary power in the admiralty courts or
in the Supreme Court in relation to the modes and forms of
proceeding. And it is evident that if the courts of admiralty in
this country used the process
in rem or process by
Page 66 U. S. 528
attachment of the property in all cases in which it was
authorized in countries governed by the civil law, it would
unavoidably in some cases come in collision with the common law
courts of the state where the parties resided, and where the
property was situated, and where other parties besides the owners
or builders, or equippers of the ship, might have an interest in,
or a claim upon, the property, which they had a right to assert in
the courts of the state.
But this difficulty was soon seen and removed. And by the Act of
May 8, 1792, 1 Stat. 275, these forms and modes of proceeding are
to be according to the principles, rules, and usages which belong
to courts of admiralty, as contradistinguished from courts of
common law. And these forms and modes of proceeding are made
subject to such alterations and additions as the respective courts
might deem expedient,
"or to such regulations as the Supreme Court of the United
States shall think proper from time to time by rule to prescribe to
any circuit or district court concerning the same."
And the power here conferred upon this Court was afterwards
enlarged by the Act of August 23, 1842.
It was under the authority of these two acts that the rule of
which we are now speaking was made in 1844; and afterwards, by
virtue of the same authority, altered by the rule adopted at
December term, 1858.
It was manifestly proper, and perhaps necessary, that this power
should be confided to the Court, for, it being the province of this
Court to determine what cases came within the admiralty and
maritime jurisdiction of the United States, its process and mode of
proceeding in such cases should be so framed as to avoid collision
with the state authorities, where rights of property were involved,
over which the state had a right to legislate, without trespassing
upon the authority of the general government. The power was
therefore given to the court not only to make rules upon this
subject, but to make them from time to time, so that if any new
difficulty should arise, it might be promptly obviated and the
modes of proceeding and the process of the admiralty courts so
molded as to accomplish that object.
Page 66 U. S. 529
The case of
The General
Smith, 4 Wheat. 438, was decided upon these
principles, and the right to proceed against the property regarded
as a mere question of process and not of jurisdiction. And the
Court held that where, upon the principles of the maritime code,
the supplies are presumed to be furnished on the credit of the
vessel or where a lien is given by the local law, the party is
entitled to proceed
in rem in the admiralty court to
enforce it; but where the supplies are presumed by the maritime
code to be furnished on the personal credit of the owner or master,
and the local law gives him no lien, although the contract is
maritime, yet he must seek his remedy against the person, and not
against the vessel. In either case, the contract is equally within
the jurisdiction of a court of admiralty. And it is obvious from
decision that the Court considered the process
in rem or
priority given for repairs or supplies to a domestic vessel by the
courts of admiralty, in those countries where the principles of the
civil law have been adopted, as forming no part of the general
maritime code, but as local laws, and therefore furnishing no
precedent for similar cases where the local law is otherwise;
consequently they form no part of the admiralty and maritime
jurisdiction conferred on the government of the United States. This
case was decided in 1819, and has always since been followed and
regarded as a leading one in the admiralty courts. Its authority
was recognized in the cases of
Peyroux v.
Howard, 7 Pet. 324; and
The New
Orleans v. Phoebus, 11 Pet. 175, and in others to
which it is unnecessary to refer. And while process against the
vessel was denied in the case of
The General Smith because
the law of Maryland gave no lien or priority, it was used and
supported in the case of
Peyroux v. Howard -- a similar
case -- upon the ground that the party had a lien on the vessel by
the law of Louisiana, and as the contract was within its
jurisdiction, it ought to give him all the rights he had acquired
under it, yet certainly the Court never supposed that the admiralty
jurisdiction was broader in Louisiana than in Maryland.
When this Court framed the rules in 1844, it, of course,
adhered
Page 66 U. S. 530
to the practice adopted in the previous cases, and by the 12th
rule authorized the process
in rem where the party was
entitled to a lien under the local or state law. But in the rules
then adopted, this rule as well as the others are explicitly
adopted as "a rule of practice," and consequently liable to be
altered from time to time whenever it was found to be inconvenient
or likely to embarrass the legitimate business of the Court. And
there could be no embarrassing difficulties in using the ordinary
process
in rem of the civil law if the state law gave the
lien in general terms, without specific conditions or limitations
inconsistent with the rules and principles which governed implied
maritime liens, and whenever this was the case, the process to
enforce it promoted the convenience and facilities of trade and
navigation by the promptness of its proceedings. It disposed at
once of the whole controversy without subjecting the party to the
costs and delay of a proceeding in the chancery or common law
courts of the state, to obtain the benefit of his lien, if he
failed to obtain satisfaction in his suit against the person in the
court of admiralty.
The state lien, however, was enforced not as a right which the
court was bound to carry into execution upon the application of the
party, but as a discretionary power which the court might lawfully
exercise for the purposes of justice where it did not involve
controversies beyond the limits of admiralty jurisdiction. In many
of the states, however, the laws were found not to harmonize with
the principles and rules of the maritime code. Certain conditions
and forms of proceeding are usually required to obtain the lien,
and it is generally declared forfeited or regarded as waived after
the lapse of a certain time, or upon some future contingency. These
conditions and limitations differ in different states, and if the
process
in rem is used wherever the local law gives the
lien, it will subject the admiralty court to the necessity of
examining and expounding the varying lien laws of every state, and
of carrying them into execution, and that too in controversies
where the existence of the lien is denied, and the right depends
altogether on a disputed construction of a state statute, or
indeed, in some
Page 66 U. S. 531
cases of conflicting claims under statutes of different states,
when the vessel has formerly belonged to the port of another state
and become subject to a lien there by the state law.
Such duties and powers are appropriate to the courts of the
state which created the lien, and are entirely alien to the
purposes for which the admiralty power was created, and form no
part of the code of laws which it was established to
administer.
Moreover, cases may and indeed have arisen where a third party
claimed a lien prior and superior to that of the libellant under
the provisions of a state statute. And where such a controversy
arises in a proceeding
in rem, the admiralty court clearly
has not power to decide it and adjust the priorities in dispute,
and would be compelled to abandon and recall its process whenever
the controversy assumed that shape.
The proceeding, therefore,
in rem, upon the ground that
the local law gave the lien where none was given by the maritime
code, was found upon experience to be inapplicable to our mixed
form of government. It was found to be inconvenient in most cases
and absolutely impracticable in others, and the rule which
sanctioned it was therefore repealed. And the repealing rule
provided that the new rule should not go into operation until the
day named in it, because it would have been unjust to those who had
already proceeded under the rule of 1844 or might institute
proceedings under it before they were aware of the alteration, to
subject them to costs and delay by a sudden and unexpected change
of a rule of practice.
The case before us was commenced before the change in the rule,
and as there was an undoubted lien acquired under the state law, we
think the court had a right to enforce it upon the principles above
stated, since no provision of the New York statute, as far as it
affected the case, was inconsistent with a maritime lien, and the
execution of the process involved no inquiries beyond the
legitimate authority of the court.
The remaining question is has this lien been forfeited or
waived? It does not appear to have been forfeited or waived
Page 66 U. S. 532
under any provision in the New York statute, nor was it waived
upon the principles of maritime law by the acceptance of Graham's
notes, unless the claimants can show that the libellants agreed to
receive them in lieu of and in place of their original claim. The
notes, in this instance, have been surrendered, and were filed in
the proceedings in the district court. And the language of the
Court in the case of
Ramsey v.
Allegre, 12 Wheat. 611, and of Judge Story in
commenting upon that case in 3 How.
44 U. S. 573,
necessarily imply that if the notes had been surrendered, the party
would have a right to stand upon his original contract and to seek
his remedy in the forum to which it originally belonged as fully as
if the notes had never been given.
In this case, the proof is positive, by the testimony of a
witness who was present at the time the notes were given, that it
was understood by the parties that they were not to discharge or
affect his lien and that the vessel was to continue liable for his
claim as before. And although the respondents appear to have
purchased without notice of this encumbrance, their want of caution
in this respect cannot deprive the libellants of a legal right
which they have done nothing to forfeit.
The decree of the circuit court is therefore affirmed, with
costs.