SCOTTEN
v.
LITTLEFIELD, TRUSTEE OF BROWN, BANKRUPT

U.S. | 1914-12-14
No. 439
235 U.S. 407 Supreme Court of the United States (1914) Negative Treatment
Also reported at: 59 L. Ed. 289 · 35 S. Ct. 125 · 1914 U.S. LEXIS 984 · SCDB 1914-044
Cited by 56 cases

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Synopsis

A bankruptcy trustee sought to use a bill of review to challenge a prior court order dismissing a reclamation petition for 300 shares of United States Steel stock, arguing that a subsequently decided Supreme Court case involving related bankruptcy issues would have required a different result. The Supreme Court affirmed the dismissal of the bill of review, holding that a subsequent appellate decision establishing new legal principles cannot serve as grounds for a bill of review, as such matters should have been raised on the original appeal.

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Opinion of the Court
Mr. Justice Day,

Memorandum opinion by

Mr. Justice Day,

by direction of the court.

This case presents another phase of the bankruptcy of A. O. Brown & Company, stock brokers in New York. See First National Bank of Princeton v. Littlefield, Trustee, 226 U. S. 110; Gorman v. Littlefield, 229 U. S. 19; Schuyler v. Littlefield, 232 U. S. 707. This case is submitted on the motion of appellee' to dismiss, affirm, or place on the summary docket. The appellants filed a petition for reclamation in the bankruptcy court, which concerned among other stocks three hundred shares of United States Steel stock, which are now the subject-matter of this controversy. On April 20, 1911, the District Court confirmed the report of the Master, and entered an order dismissing the petitions of appéllants and of some other claimants. Appellants appealed to the Circuit Court of Appeals, and that court affirmed the District Court, 193 Fed. Rep. 24. The case then came to this court, and the judgment of the Court of Appeals was affirmed, 226 U. S. 110. On August 4,1913, the bill of review with which the present proceeding is concerned, was filed in the District Court. This was more than two years after the original order in the District Court, dismissing the reclamation proceeding, was made. The District Court dismissed the bill of review, 213 Fed. Rep. 701. That decree was affirmed in the Circuit Court of Appeals, 213 Fed. Rep. 705. Then the case was appealed here.

Both courts below put their decisions on the ground that the appeal to the Circuit Court of Appeals from the original order of the District Court in the reclamation proceedings really involved the claim for the United States Steel stock in its present aspect, and that if not presented to the Court of Appeals when there on appeal it could not be held back and made the subject of a bill of review, as is now attempted to be done. We think this decision was clearly right. Furthermore, the ground alleged for the bill of review now is, that the principles which determined the disposition of the Gorman Case, 229 U. S. 19 (decided May 26, 1913, a little more than two years after the decree in the District Court) reversing the Circuit Court of Appeals in the same case, 175 Fed Rep. 769, would, had they been-applied in this .case, have required a different result in the District Court in dealing with the original petition in reclamation, so far as the three hundred shares of the United States Steel stock, pledged with the Hanover National Bank, are concerned.

Bills of review are on two grounds; first, error of law apparent On the face of the record without further examination of matters of fact; second, new facts discovered since the decree, which should materially affect the decree and probably induce a different result. 2 Bates’ Federal Equity Procedure, 762; Street’s Federal Equity Practice, Vol. 2, § 2151.

If the decision in the Gorman Case would have required a different result if the principles upon which it was decided had been applied in the original proceeding, which we do not find it necessary to decide, such subsequent decision will not lay the foundation for a bill of review for errors of law apparent, or for new matter in pais discovered since the decree and probably requiring a different result. Tilghman v. Werk, 39 Fed. Rep. 680 (opinion by Judge Jackson, afterwards Mr. Justice Jackson of this court); Hoffman v. Knox, Circuit Court of Appeals, Fourth Circuit, 50 Fed. Rep. 484, 491 (opinion by Chief Justice Fuller).

The decree of the Circuit Court of Appeals is

Affirmed.

Cases With Similar Vibessemantic neighbors from the corpus

Citator

Cited By (16 total)

  • State v. Wilkins-Austin Corp., 150 Fla. 604 (Fla. 1942)
    …case failed to show that the committee named in the act had made a valid assessment before passage [*610] of the act, and that therefore the decision was based on the evidence, or the lack of it, in that case. In the case of Scotten v. Littlefield, 235 U. S. 407, 57 L. Ed. 289, the Supreme Court of the United States held, quoting the second headnote, as follows: “2. A subsequent decision of the Federal Supreme Court, which would have required a different result if the governing principles had been applied…
  • Hazel-Atlas Glass Co. v. Hartford-Empire Co., 322 U.S. 238 (U.S. 1944)
    …eeking the evidence to support an attack upon the decree. But it is highly possible that, upon a full trial, it will be found that Hazel held back what it knew and, if so, is not entitled now to attack the original decree. In Scotten v. Littlefield, 235 U. S. 407, in affirming the denial of a bill of review, this court said that if the claim now made was “not presented to the Court of Appeals when there on appeal it could not be held back and made the subject of a bill of review, as is now attempted to be do…
    1 / 2
  • John Simmons Co. v. Grier Bros. Co., 258 U.S. 82 (U.S. 1922)
    …howed an error of . law apparent on the face of the record without further examination of matters of fact, or. constituted a new fact discovered since the decree and materially affecting it, the court held on the authority of Scotten v. Littlefield, 235 U. S. 407, 411; Tilghman v. Werk, 39 Fed. 680; and Hoffman v. Knox, 50 Fed. 484, that the bill of review could not be maintained. The cases cited are to the effect that, in the application of the ancient rule of practice in equity, based upon Lord Bacon’s fi…

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