inally invoked as giving cognizance to that court as a court of the
United States. Gregory v. Van Ee, 643.
14. By authority of the directors of a national bank in Chicago, which
had acquired some of its own stock, the individual note of its cashier,
secured by a pledge of that stock was, through a broker in Portage,
sold to a bank there. The note not being paid at maturity the Port-
age bank sued the Chicago bank in assumpsit, declaring specially on
the note, which it alleged was made by the bank in the cashier's
name, and also setting out the common counts. The bank set up
that the purchase of its own stock was illegal and that money bor-
rowed to pay a debt contracted for that purpose was equally forbid-
den by Rev. Stat. § 5201. The trial court was requested by the
Chicago bank to rule several propositions of law, and declined to do
so. Judgment was then entered for the Portage bank. The Supreme
Court of the State of Illinois held that the Portage bank was entitled
to recover under the common counts, and that it was not necessary
to consider whether the trial court had ruled correctly on the prop-
ositions of law submitted to it. Held, that that court in rendering
such judgment, denied no title, right, privilege, or immunity spe-
cially set up or claimed under the laws of the United States, and that
the writ of error must be dismissed. Chemical Bank v. City Bank of
Portage, 646.
See CASES AFFIRMED, 3;
NEW TRIAL.
B. JURISDICTION OF CIRCUIT COURTS OF APPEALS.
1. Circuit Courts of Appeals have no jurisdiction over the judgments of
territorial courts in capital cases, and in cases of infamous crimes.
Folsom v. United States, 121.
2. This construction of the statute is imperative from its language, and is
not affected by the fact that convictions for minor offences are review-
able on a second appeal, while convictions for capital and infamous
crimes are not so reviewable. Ib.
3. Under the act of March 3, 1887, c. 373, as corrected by the act of August
13, 1888, c. 866, a defendant, who enters a general appearance, in an
action between citizens of different States, thereby waives the right
afterwards to object that he or another defendant is not an inhabitant
of the district in which the action is brought. Interior Construction &
Improvement Co. v. Gibney, 217.
C. JURISDICTION OF CIRCUIT COURTS OF THE UNITED STATES.
1. It is established doctrine, to which the court adheres, that the constitu-
tional privilege of a grantee or purchaser of property, being a citizen
of one of the States, to invoke the jurisdiction of a Circuit Court of
the United States for the protection of his rights as against a citizen
of another State the value of the matter in dispute being sufficient
for the purpose
- cannot be affected or impaired merely because of
the motive that induced his grantor to convey, or his vendee to sell
and deliver, the property, provided such conveyance or such sale and
delivery was a real transaction by which the title passed without the
grantor or vendor reserving or having any right or power to compel or
require a reconveyance or return to him of the property in question.
Lehigh Mining & Manufacturing Co. v. Kelly, 327.
2. Citizens of Virginia were in possession of lands in that State, claiming
title, to which also a corporation organized under the laws of Virginia
had for some years laid claim. In order to transfer the corporation's
title and claim to a citizen of another State, thus giving a Circuit
Court of the United States jurisdiction over an action to recover the
lands, the stockholders of the Virginia corporation organized them-
selves into a corporation under the laws of Pennsylvania, and the
Virginia corporation then conveyed the lands to the Pennsylvania
corporation, and the latter corporation brought this action against the
citizens of Virginia to recover possession of the lands. No consider-
ation passed for the transfer. Both corporations still exist. Held,
that these facts took this case out of the operation of the established
doctrine above stated and made of the transaction a mere device to
give jurisdiction to the Circuit Court, and that it was a fraud upon
that court, as well as a wrong to the defendants. Ib.
3. Circuit Courts of the United States have jurisdiction of actions in which
the United States are plaintiffs, without regard to the value of the
matter in dispute. United States v. Sayward, 493.
See CORPORATION, 1;
HABEAS CORPUS, 1;
JURISDICTION, A, 13.
D. JURISDICTION OF THE COURT OF CLAIMS.
1. The act of March 3, 1891, c. 538, 26 Stat. 851, "to provide for the adju-
dication and payment of claims arising from Indian depredations,"
confers, by § 1, clause 1, no jurisdiction upon the Court of Claims to
adjudicate upon such a claim, made by a person who was not a citizen
of the United States at the time when the injury was suffered, although
he subsequently became so; nor, by § 1, clause 2, unless the claim was
one which, on March 3, 1885, had been examined and allowed by the
Department of the Interior or was then pending there for examina-
tion. Johnson v. United States, 546.
2. Any claim made against an Executive Department, "involving disputed
facts or controverted questions of law, where the amount in contro-
versy exceeds three thousand dollars, or where the decision will affect
a class of cases, or furnish a precedent for the future action of any
Executive Department in the adjustment of a class of cases, without
regard to the amount involved in the particular case, or where any
authority, right, privilege, or exemption is claimed or denied under the
Constitution of the United States," may be transmitted to the Court
of Claims by the head of such Department under Rev. Stat. § 1063,
for final adjudication; provided, such claim be not barred by limita-
tion, and be one of which, by reason of its subject-matter and char-
acter, that court could take judicial cognizance at the voluntary suit
of the claimant. United States v. New York, 598.
3. Any claim embraced by Rev. Stat. § 1063, without regard to its amount,
and whether the claimant consents or not, may be transmitted under
the act of March 3, 1883, c. 116, to the Court of Claims by the head of
the Executive Department in which it is pending, for a report to such
Department of facts and conclusions of law for "its guidance and
action." Ib.
4. Any claim embraced by that section may, in the discretion of the Exec-
utive Department in which it is pending, and with the express consent
of the plaintiff, be transmitted to the Court of Claims, under the act
of March 3, 1887, c. 359, without regard to the amount involved, for
a report, merely advisory in its character, of facts or conclusions of
law. lb.
5. In every case, involving a claim of money, transmitted by the head of
an Executive Department to the Court of Claims under the act of
March 3, 1883, c. 116, a final judgment or decree may be rendered
when it appears to the satisfaction of the court, upon the facts estab-
lished, that the case is one of which the court, at the time such claim
was filed in the Department, could have taken jurisdiction, at the vol-
untary suit of the claimant, for purposes of final adjudication. Ib.
6. Whether the words "or matter" in the second section of that act em-
brace any matters, except those involving the payment of money, and
of which the Court of Claims under the statutes regulating its juris-
diction could, at the voluntary suit of the claimant, take cognizance
for purposes of final judgment or decree, is not considered. Ib.
7. As the claim of the State of New York, the subject of controversy in
this case, was presented to the Treasury Department before it was
barred by limitation, its transmission by the Secretary of the Treasury
to the Court of Claims for adjudication was only a continuation of the
original proceeding commenced in that Department in 1862; and the
delay by the Department in disposing of the matter before the expira-
tion of six years after the cause of action accrued, could not impair
the rights of the State. Ib.
8. The $91,320.84 paid by the State of New York for interest upon its
bonds issued in 1861 to defray the expenses to be incurred in raising
troops for the national defence was a principal sum which the United
States agreed to pay, and not interest within the meaning of the rule
prohibiting the allowance of interest accruing upon claims against the
United States prior to the rendition of judgment thereon. Ib.
9. The claim of the State of New York for money paid on account of
interest to the commissioners of the Canal Fund, is not one against
the United States for interest as such, but is a claim for costs, charges,
and expenses properly incurred and paid by the State in aid of the
general government, and is embraced by the act of Congress declaring
that the States would be indemnified by the general government for
money so expended. Ib.
E. JURISDICTION OF STATE COURTS.
1. It is for the state court, having jurisdiction of the offence charged in a
proceeding before it, and of the accused, to determine whether the
indictment sufficiently charges the offence of murder in the first degree.
Bergemann v. Backer, 157 U. S. 655, affirmed and applied. Kohl v.
Lehlback, 293.
2. Independently of constitutional or statutory provisions allowing it, an
appeal to a higher court of a State from a judgment of conviction
in a lower court is not a matter of absolute right; and as it may be
accorded upon such terms as the State thinks proper, the refusal to
grant a writ of error or to stay an execution does not warrant a Fed-
eral court to interfere in the prisoner's behalf by writ of habeas
corpus. Ib.
3. When one of the jury by which a person accused of murder is convicted
is an alien, and the accused takes no exception to his acting as a juror
and makes no challenge, and on trial is convicted and sentenced, it is
for the state court to determine whether the verdict shall be set aside
on the ground that he was tried by improper persons, as the disquali-
fication of alienage is only cause of challenge, which may be waived,
either voluntarily, or through negligence, or through want of knowl-
edge. lb.
JURY TRIAL.
See CONSTITUTIONAL LAW, 3.
See CONTRACT, 2;
CORPORATION, 2, 3.
1. A petition for the condemnation of land for a light-house, filed by the
Attorney General upon the application of the Secretary of the Treasury,
under the act of August 1, 1888, c. 728, should be in the name of the
United States. Chappell v. United States, 499.
2. The only trial by jury required in proceedings in a court of the United
States for the condemnation of land under the act of August 1, 1888,
c. 728, is a trial at the bar of the court upon the question of damages
to the owner of the land.
See CONSTITUTIONAL LAW, 6.
1. As the controversy below in this case was what is known in the juris-
prudence of Alabama as a statutory claim suit, growing out of attach-
ment proceedings, the law of Alabama, as interpreted by the Supreme
Court of that State in its rulings, will be followed here. Bamberger v.
Schoolfield, 149.
2. Under the law of Alabama a debtor has the right to prefer a creditor,
either by paying his debt in money, or by paying it by a sale and
transfer of property to the debtor; and if such sale and transfer are
real, and are made in good faith, for a fair price, if they are honestly
executed to extinguish the debt and do extinguish it, and contain no
reservation of an interest or benefit in favor of the vendor, they are
valid, and pass the property to the vendee, even if it further appears
that the vendor was insolvent at the time, that the vendee knew that
fact, and that, in making the sale the vendor had a fraudulent intent
to defraud his other creditors by the preference, and the remaining
creditors would, in consequence of the sale, be unable to obtain the
payment of their debts. Ib.
3. In such case if the fact of indebtedness, and the fact that the goods
were sold in payment thereof at their reasonable fair value are estab-
lished to the satisfaction of the jury, and if it be contended, in avoid-
ance thereof, that the trade was simulated, and that there was a secret
trust or benefit reserved to the debtor, the burden is on the contesting
creditor to establish it. Ib.
4. The employment of such a vendor by the vendee in a clerical capacity,
and the subsequent transfer of the property by the vendee to the wife
of the vendor, though circumstances which may be considered by the
jury in determining the validity of the sale and transfer, do not of
themselves render them illegal in law. Ib.
5. When a request for instructions presents a supposititious case, for the
establishment of which there is no proof of any kind in the case, it
should be refused. Ib.
6. The second section of the fourteenth article of the constitution of Ala-
bama, and the act of the legislature of that State of February 28, 1887,
have been held by the courts of Alabama as not intended to interfere
with matters of commerce between the States, and to have no applica-
tion to transactions such as here under consideration. Ib.
7. There was no error in the instructions as to the bearing on the rights
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