ST. LOUIS & SAN FRANCISCO RAILWAY COMPANY & OTHERS
v.
WILSON
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St. Louis & San Francisco Railway Company sought to remove a lawsuit from state court to federal court, but the Supreme Court held that removal was improper because the railroad company was an indispensable party to Wilson's action for transfer of stock, meaning the case could not proceed without the company's presence and thus constituted a single, non-removable controversy. The Court affirmed the order remanding the case back to state court, establishing that separate defenses or issues in a single action do not necessarily create separate controversies sufficient to remove a case to federal court.
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Mr. Chief Justioe Waite delivered the opinion of the court. After reciting the facts as above stated, he continued:
There is but one controversy in this case, and that is asdo the duty of the railroad company to transfer to Wilson the stock standing in the name of the Seligmans on its books and to issue new certificates therefor. Upon the one side'of that controversy is the plaintiff, a citizen of Missouri, and on the other the railroad company, a Missouri corporation.- The sole purpose of the suit is to establish the duty and enforce its performance. This cannot be done without the presence of the company, for it is upon the company itself that the decree must operate. The Seligmans are made parties only in aid of the principal relief which is asked. As the stock stands in their names on the books, the company may well claim a judicial finding in the cause which shall bind them, if upon the. final hearing a transfer is ordered. The suit, therefore, is in truth and in form against both the company and the Seligmans On a single cause of action, and cannot be removed unless the separate answer of the Seligmans introduces a separate controversy. This we have held in Louisville & Nashville Railroad Co. v. Ide, just decided, is not necessarily the effect of separate issues under sep- • arate defences to the same actipn. No'relief whatever can be granted unless it is found to be the duty of the company to transfer 'the stock, and as to that controversy the company is an indispensable party. Central Railroad Company of New Jersey v. Mills, 113 U. S. 249; Thayer v. Life Association, 112 U. S. 717.
The order remanding th,e cause is Affirmed.
Cases With Similar Vibessemantic neighbors from the corpus
Citator
Cited By (11 total)
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Willing v. Chicago Auditorium Ass'n, 277 U.S. 274 (U.S. 1928)
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Wilson v. Oswego Twp., 151 U.S. 56 (U.S. 1894)…the Oswego township, on the other, without the presence of the Union Savings Association, so as to warrant the removal as a separable controversy. The cases of Thayer v. Life Association, 112 U. S. 717, St. Louis & San Francisco Railway v. Wilson, 114 U. S. 60, and Crump v. Thurber, 115 U. S. 56, are not distinguishable in principle from the present case. In the former case the situation of the parties was substantially the same as in the case under consideration, and it was held that the resident corpora…
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Swan Land & Cattle Co. v. Frank, 148 U.S. 603 (U.S. 1893)…all. 626. The same rule is applied in respect to averments as to citizenship of necessary parties to confer jurisdiction or the right of removal. Thayer v. Life Association of America, 112 U. S. 717, 719; St. Louis & San Francisco Railway v. Wilson, 114 U. S. 60, 62. To take the present case out of the operation of the general rule, it is argued on behalf of appellants that the bill discloses such a practical abandonment of their franchises as to amount to a dissolution of the vendor corporations. We canno…
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Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligenceAuthorities Cited
- The Cent. R.R. Co. of N.J. v. Mills & Another, 113 U.S. 249 (U.S. 1885)
- Thayer & Another v. Life Ass'n of Am. & Others, 112 U.S. 717 (U.S. 1885)