Before this Court can entertain jurisdiction to review a
judgment of the state court, it must appear that one of the
questions mentioned in the twenty-fifth section of the Judiciary
Act was raised in the state court and actually decided by it; that
is to say, the question must have received the consideration or
attention of the court. It is not sufficient that this Court can
see that it ought to have been raised, and that it might have been
decided.
The twenty-fifth section of the Judiciary Act provides that a
final judgment in the highest court of a state where is drawn in
question the validity of a statute of any state, on the ground of
its being repugnant to the Constitution of the United States, and
the decision is in favor of such validity, may be reexamined in
this Court.
With this law in force, and under a statute of the State of
Missouri which authorized apparently a proceeding
in rem
against vessels for supplies furnished to them, Boylan filed a
petition in one of the state courts of Missouri against the
steamboat
Victory (which was made defendant to the suit),
for supplies furnished in her home port at the request of her
owner, and for which he claimed a lien on the vessel to the amount
of $4,214. The items of the account were set forth in a bill of
particulars accompanying the petition, and the plaintiffs prayed
for a warrant of seizure, on judgment, and for sale of the boat to
satisfy their claim.
The owner of the vessel appeared and filed an answer in which he
admitted $500 of the claim to be due, and to be a lien on the boat,
but denied that any other items or amounts
Page 73 U. S. 383
were due or owing by the boat, or that they were a lien thereon.
Testimony was also taken which showed that the contest was about
the amount due and the date at which some of it ceased to be a
lien. But there was apparently nothing in the answer, or in the
testimony, or in the instructions asked or given to the jury, from
which an inference could be drawn, that it was denied that supplies
of the character set forth were a lien on the vessel to which they
were furnished, or that the statute which gave the lien was
asserted to be void, or that the jurisdiction of the court to
enforce it was controverted.
The state court ordered the vessel to be sold, and this judgment
having been affirmed in the supreme court of the state, the case
was brought here as within the twenty-fifth section of the
Judiciary Act above quoted, and with a view of reversing that
judgment, the ground of the expected reversal being, of course,
that the case was one of admiralty cognizance, and was therefore
exclusively within the jurisdiction of the district courts of the
United States, and because the statute of Missouri which authorized
the proceeding in the state court was for that reason
unconstitutional.
Page 73 U. S. 384
MR. JUSTICE MILLER delivered the opinion of the Court.
The question which we are asked to decide --
viz.,
whether such a case as this is one of admiralty cognizance, and is
therefore exclusively within the jurisdiction of the courts of the
United States, and whether the statute of Missouri which authorized
the proceeding is for that reason void -- is an interesting one,
and if it had been raised and decided in the court from which the
record comes, we would be bound to decide it here. But we do not
think it is a fair inference from that record that the question was
presented to the court or was decided by it.
It has been repeatedly held by this Court that before it can
entertain jurisdiction to revise the judgment of a state court, the
point which we are called upon to review must have been raised and
must have been decided adversely to the plaintiff in error. This is
so well established that it would be a useless labor to cite
authorities to sustain it.
It is true we have said this need not appear by express
averment, but if the record shows by necessary intendment that the
point was decided, it is sufficient, and the cases of
Craig v.
State of Missouri and
Bridge Proprietors v. Hoboken
Company are cited to sustain the proposition. It is one which
does not need support. It is fully conceded.
But we are of opinion that it must appear that the point
mentioned in the Judiciary Act was actually decided in the state
court, that it received the consideration of the court, and it is
not sufficient that now, on fuller examination, with the aid of
counsel here, we can see that it was a point which ought to have
been raised and which might have been decided. In the case of
Bridge Proprietors v. Hoboken Company, cited by counsel
for plaintiff, the Court recites with approbation the following
language from the previous case of
Crowell v. Randell:
*
"It is not sufficient to show that the question might have
arisen or been applicable to the case
Page 73 U. S. 385
unless it is further shown by the record that it did arise and
was applied by the state court to the case."
It is insisted that inasmuch as the authority of the state court
rests solely on the state statute, the validity of that statute was
necessarily a point in its judgment, but it would contradict the
experience of all who are familiar with courts to assume that every
time a court acts under a statute, the validity of the statute or
the jurisdiction of the court receives its consideration. This is
rarely so unless the question is raised by one of the parties and
called to the attention of the court.
The presumption from this record is entirely the other way. The
defendant in his pleading admits impliedly the jurisdiction of the
court, the validity of the statute, and the existence of the lien.
He only denies that the full amount claimed is due, and no other
question is raised or suggested by the bill of exceptions. Nor does
it appear that any other question was raised in the supreme court
of the state than that which was considered by the inferior court.
There was therefore no occasion for the court to consider the
question raised here by counsel.
Writ of error dismissed.
*
35 U. S. 10 Pet.
368.
