Jurisdiction Commons^™

Bankruptcy-Jurisdiction Of Bankruptcy Court To Determine Stockholders' Vote Necessary To Approve Proposed Sale Of Corporation's Assets To Debtor In Reorganization, Bernard Goldstone S. Ed.

Michigan Law Review

Lessee railroad, which had leased and operated property of lessor railroad for many years, entered reorganization under section 77 of the Bankruptcy Act. Under the plan of reorganization promulgated by the Interstate Commerce Commission and approved by the bankruptcy court, lessor was given the alternative of selling its property to the reorganized railroad or having the lease disaffirmed by the debtor and its property returned. This proposal was submitted for acceptance by a majority vote of lessor's stockholders. Respondents, stockholders of lessor, sought an injunction in a state court of Georgia to restrain lessor's officers from certifying the acceptance in …

The Venue Of Probate And Administration Proceedings, Paul E. Basye

Michigan Law Review

With the division of each state into counties or districts and the creation in each such subdivision of some court for the probate of wills and the administration of estates, it became necessary to designate which of such courts should undertake these functions in a particular estate. It is not the purpose of this study to consider problems arising out of conflicts of jurisdiction as between states insofar as independent determinations of domicile of a decedent may be made. That a decedent died a resident of the state undertaking an administration upon his estate will be assumed; or, if he …

Admiralty - Uniformity Rule, William C. Whitehead

Michigan Law Review

From the words of the Federal Constitution the federal courts have spelled out the rule that maritime matters shall be governed by a uniform set of laws. These laws consist of the general maritime law at the adoption of the Constitution plus regulations subsequently promulgated by Congress. The decisions which have outlined the "uniformity rule" have concerned themselves with admiralty's interrelationship with interstate commerce. A recent application of the rule suggests another problem which uniformity is designed to circumvent--the difficulty of enforcing local rules against subjects on navigable waters. The federal courts have not always been precise in their application …

Federal Courts - Review Of State Courts Decision Involving Federal And Nonfederal Ouestions, John C. Johnston

Michigan Law Review

In exercising appellate jurisdiction over federal questions raised in the highest court of a state, the Supreme Court of the United States has refused to adopt the view that the existence of a federal question in the record or decision of the state court will empower it to decide every other question that is raised in the case. Correlated to this refusal to review the nonfederal question is the further self-imposed limitation that where the decision of the state court rests upon a nonfederal ground sufficient in itself to support the judgment of the state court, the Supreme Court will …

Conflict Of Laws - Workmen's Compensation - Local Statute As A Defense To A Local Cause Of Action, John C. Johnston

Michigan Law Review

Plaintiff resided and was employed in Texas as the manager of a local store owned by a corporation which operated a chain of stores in various states. While visiting the main office of his employer in Illinois, he was injured through the negligence of the defendant taxicab company. After applying for and receiving compensation from his employer under the Workmen's Compensation Law of Texas, plaintiff then brought action in Illinois against defendant to recover damages for his personal injuries. Under the Workmen's Compensation Act of Texas an employee who has received compensation under the act may bring an action against …

Federal Courts - Conflict Between The Federal Declaratory Judgments Act And The Johnson Act, Spencer E. Irons

Michigan Law Review

Plaintiff gas company contracted with defendant city to furnish gas from a certain field at rates fixed by ordinance. Plaintiff reserved the right, when this field became insufficient, to furnish gas from other fields at rates to be adjusted in accordance with the increased cost. In a suit in the federal district court for a declaratory judgment, plaintiff sought a determination that the local field had become insufficient, and that it was necessary to furnish gas from other fields. Plaintiff alleged that defendant city refused to recognize the changed conditions and insisted that plaintiff continue to furnish gas at the …

Circuit Courts And The Nisi Prius System: The Making Of An Appellate Court, William Wirt Blume

Michigan Law Review

Judicial systems organized under the influence of the English tradition have exhibited a tendency to pass through four stages of development. (1) In the first stage the highest court (not taking into consideration legislative bodies) has final appellate jurisdiction and a superior original jurisdiction, civil and criminal. The court is composed of three or more judges who sit in bank for the trial of cases. The judges may sit at a central place or go on circuit throughout the territory. (2) In the second stage the highest court has both original and appellate jurisdiction but does not undertake to try …

The Control Of Inferior Jurisdictions By The Kentucky Court Of Appeals, Charles M. Gadd

Kentucky Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Labor Law -- Anti-Injunction Acts -- Presence Or Absence Of Labor Dispute As Affecting "Jurisdiction", Michigan Law Review

Michigan Law Review

Plaintiff secured a temporary injunction against the picketing of her beauty shop by members of a union who sought an agreement as to the prices which plaintiff would charge her customers. None of plaintiff's employees were dissatisfied with the terms and conditions of employment. The trial court, on the basis of allegations in plaintiff's bill, affidavits and oral testimony, but without an answer being filed by defendant, held that the case did not "involve or grow out of a labor dispute" and awarded a temporary injunction. A Minnesota statute provided that no court of the state should have "jurisdiction" to …

Judgments - Default Judgments Rendered Without Jurisdiction - Validating Effect Of A Subsequent General Appearance, Richard B. Maxwell

Michigan Law Review

The effect of a general appearance by the defendant following a default judgment rendered without jurisdiction over the person of the defendant has been again raised by the recent Wisconsin case of Schwantz v. Morris. In this case the original judgment was invalid for lack of jurisdiction over the defendants, but the Supreme Court of Wisconsin held, that by joining non-jurisdictional grounds with jurisdictional grounds in a motion to set the judgment aside, the defendants had waived any defects in or objections to the jurisdiction of the court and that this waiver related back to the time of the …

Public Utilities-Injunction Restraining Enforcement Of Rate Order Of State Commission-Jurisdiction Of Federal Court Under Johnson Act

Michigan Law Review

Plaintiffs sued in a federal district court for an injunction restraining enforcement of an order of the Corporation Commission of Oklahoma reducing gas rates. The plaintiffs alleged that the new rates were confiscatory and in violation of due process of law under the Fourteenth Amendment. It appeared that there was much uncertainty in the decisions of the Supreme Court of Oklahoma as to whether the appeal to that court from the orders of the Corporation Commission were legislative or judicial. Held, that in view of the uncertainty of an opportunity for judicial review of the orders of the Commission, …

Attack On Decrees Of Divorce, Albert C. Jacobs

Michigan Law Review

This paper deals with attacks on decrees of divorce. The attack may arise in the state of the divorce or elsewhere. F-1 is used to designate the state in which the divorce was granted; F-2 a state other than that in which the decree in' question was rendered. The attack in F-1 may be on purely local or non-jurisdictional grounds, such as fraud, collusion, duress or perjury, or upon the ground that the proper jurisdictional requirements were lacking. The attack in F-2 will generally be on jurisdictional grounds, though in certain situations a decree has been impeached for non-jurisdictional factors. …

Splitting The Cause Of Action Before A Justice--The Strange Case Of Bane V. Wilson, Robert T. Donley

West Virginia Law Review

No abstract provided.

Corporations-Purchase Of Notes And Mortgages As "Doing Business"

Michigan Law Review

C was engaged in loaning money in Idaho. He sold many of the notes and mortgages which he thus received to the plaintiff, a foreign corporation. It was his practice, nevertheless, to collect the interest on these notes and remit it to the plaintiff. The actual sales of the notes and mortgages occurred in Chicago. In this manner the plaintiff acquired the note of the defendant, a resident of Idaho and his mortgage on Idaho land. The Idaho statute forbids a foreign corporation "doing business" in the State to sue in its courts without taking certain qualifying steps. The plaintiff, …

Corporations--Liability Of Stockholder In Non-Complying Foreign Corporation

Michigan Law Review

The defendant was a stockholder in the A corporation, incorporated in Indiana to go business there, but carrying on its principal business in Tennessee where It had failed to comply with a law requiring foreign corporations to domesticate; Plaintiff, a holder of a trade acceptance on which the A corporation was primarily liable, sued defendant in Indiana, liability on the trade acceptance having been incurred in Tennessee. The A corporation being insolvent, plaintiff sought to hold the defendant personally liable on the ground that the failure of the corporation to comply with domestication statutes of Tennessee made its stockholders liable …

Process In Actions Against Non-Resident Motorists, Maurice S. Culp

Michigan Law Review

Personal service on the defendant within the jurisdiction of a State is the conventional form of process in personal actions. But considerations of convenience and public need have resulted in recognizing an additional form of process in personal actions against nonresident motorists. Statutes in 35 States authorize the commencement of suit against the non-resident motorist by substituted service on a public official of the State where the cause of action arises; the official is made for this purpose the agent or attorney of the non-resident motorist.

It is proposed herein to discuss (1) the constitutional basis of such legislation, and …

Evidence -The Possibility Of Incrimination In A State Jurisdiction Does Not Warrant The Assertion Of The Constitutional Privilege In Federal Proceedings

Michigan Law Review

On indictment for the refusal to give information requested by the authorized revenue agent, the appellee interposed a special plea averring that it would compel him to become a witness against himself in violation of the Fifth Amendment of the federal Constitution which reads, "nor shall any person be compelled to be a witness against himself." Held, the danger of incrimination in a state court was not grounds for asserting the constitutional privilege. United States v. Murdock, 284 U. S. 141, 52 Sup. Ct. 63, 76 L. ed. 83 (1931).

Divorce - Domicil - Recognition Of Foreign Decrees, Florence K. Frankel

Michigan Law Review

The New York Court of Appeals has re-emphasized some well-established principles of divorce jurisdiction in the recent case of Fischer v. Fischer. In a suit involving the validity of a second marriage, W proved a Nevada divorce from her first husband, a citizen of New York, who had been served in New York but had not appeared to defend the litigation. The court denied recognition to the Nevada decree because W's residence in Nevada, while it conformed with the statutory requirements of that forum, was proved to have been acquired solely for the purpose of securing a divorce. The …

Some Comments On The Reserved Power To Alter, Amend And Repeal Corporate Charters, Gustavus Ohlinger

Michigan Law Review

The old theories as to the nature, creation and powers of corporations which during the last hundred years have been obscured, but today are coming more and more to the fore in legal literature, in the adjudications of the courts, and in recent revisions of corporation acts suggest a re-examination of the power of state legislatures to alter, amend and repeal corporate charters under the reservations contained in many state constitutions and statutes, both as related to those theories and as they apply to recent and impending social and economic changes.

Crimes-Former Jeopardy-Prosecution In Two Counties For A Continuous Act

Michigan Law Review

Defendants transported liquor by a single, uninterrupted act from A county to B county in the same state. Having been convicted and fined in B county for the transportation within its boundaries, they were later indicted in A county for that part of the transportation which took place in that territory. A plea of former jeopardy was sustained by the trial judge, and on appeal this holding was affirmed by a divided court, which held, the act constituted a single offense, punishable in either county, but not in both. State v. Shimman et al. (Ohio, 1930) 172 N.E. 367.

Crimes - Venue- Non-Support, Abandonment, And Desertion

Michigan Law Review

Defendant was divorced by his wife in A county in 1926. In 1929, defendant was indicted for non-support of his children, in B county, where his former wife and the children had maintained their home since the divorce. An objection to the venue was raised by the defense, on the ground that, if a crime was committed, it was consummated in A county, where defendant had been living during the time he was charged with non-support. Held, that "the venue of non-support is where that support should be rendered." State v. Anderson (Or. 1930) 290 Pac. 1904

The Institute's Restatement And The Michigan Law, Herbert F. Goodrich

Michigan Law Review

The task which the American Law Institute has undertaken is to make a statement of the common law, in its various branches. The end in view is not codification; indeed the idea is directly opposed to codification. It is hoped to have, when the work is completed, an accurate statement of existing common law, carefully and systematically made, from which local variations and peculiarities have been ironed out. It is hoped, in other words, to restore both accuracy and continuity to the pattern of the common law fabric as it is woven in our judicial mills.

Conflict Of Laws-Jurisdiction-Foreign Corporation Not Doing Business In The State

Michigan Law Review

A summons addressed to the defendant corporation was served upon one of its officers at his private residence in Minnesota. The defendant, appearing specially, moved to set aside the service on the ground that it was a foreign corporation not transacting business in the state and that it had empowered no one to accept service of process there in its behalf. The plaintiff contended that the acquisition and ownership of property in Minnesota brought the defendant into the state and under the jurisdiction of its courts. Held, jurisdiction over the corporate property did not give jurisdiction over the corporate …

Situs Of Corporate Shares For Administration Purposes

Michigan Law Review

Questions concerning the situs of corporate shares for tax purposes have been productive of much litigation and a fairly extensive body of authority on the subject has accumulated. Cases dealing with the situs of shares for purposes of administration, on the other hand, arc very rare. This latter fact may be ascribed to the acceptance, in all states except Illinois and Mississippi, of the common law rule that the distribution of personal property shall be governed by the law of the decedent's domicil. But in those two jurisdictions, the legislature has provided that, "All personal property situated in this state …

Conflict Of Laws-Adoption-Jurisdiction

Michigan Law Review

Sociologists treat of the subject of adoption very sparsely. It is but a desired end in their work, and having its foundation in law, yields but slightly to sociological supervision. However, there exist many reports and treatises in the field of child placement and the effect thereof on the child. The most cursory examination of these works reveals that from the social point of view, at least, the work is conducted with but one end in view, i. e., the welfare of the child. Adoption, as a means to this end, has the same reason for its foundation. To this …

The Supreme Court's Adjudication Of Constitutional Issues In 1921-1922, Iv, Thomas Reed Powell

Michigan Law Review

That contracts between private parties cannot stand in the way of exercises of the police power for the promotion of health, morals and safety is firmly established. This principle was invoked against objection to rent regulation in decisions of the preceding term, and it is reiterated in Edgar A. Levy Leasing Co. v. Siegel. In one of the cases involved in this decision a tenant was relieved of a contract made after the statute was enacted, and the landlord here encountered the further doctrine that "of course, a lease made subsequent to the enactment of a statute cannot be …

Note And Comment, Edwin C. Goddard, George Seletto, Edson R. Sunderland, Victor H. Lane, Burke Shartel, George E. Longstaff

Michigan Law Review

Carriers - Second Cummins Amendment - It was seven years after the Carmack Amendment of the Hepburn Act of i9o6 before the Supreme Court began that series of decisions, extending from Adams Express Co. v. Croninger, 226 U. S. 491 (1913), to George N. Pierce Co. v. Wells, Fargo & Co., 236 U. S. 278 (1915), which directly resulted in the First Cummins Amendment of March, 1915. One has only to read those cases, reviewed in 13 Micn. L. REv. 59o, and other notes referred to in 17 MICH. L. Rzv. 183, to see that the language of the Cummins …

Methods For Relieving Courts Of Last Resort From The Growing Burden Of Appeals, Edson R. Sunderland

Articles

"At the last meeting of the Michigan State Bar Association, held in Detroit in June, 1920, the question of employing an intermediate appellate court in this state, as a means for relieving the Supreme Court and expediting the disposal of appeals, was discussed at some length, and it was thereupon moved and carried that the whole subject be referred to the Committee on Legislation and Law Reform to be investigated, and that the Committee report upon the matter at the next meeting of the Association."

Extraterritorial Effect Of The Equitable Decree, Willard T. Barbour

Articles

ANYONE whom the study of equity has led into the by-paths of V Canon Law will recall that the Sext ends with a splendid array of imposing maxims, not improbably the source of the Latin maxims with which every lawyer is familiar. The inveterate habit formed by the ecclesiastics of expressing a legal principle in a short and crisp formula persisted when they came into the courts of law and is peculiarly in evidence among the chancellors of the fifteenth century. What may at first have been merely casual became through repetition a habit and the result has been to …

Effect At The Situs Rei, Of A Decree Ordering Conveyance Of Foreign Land, Edgar N. Durfee

Articles

In a recent article in this Review, Prof. Willard Barbour discussed the question indicated by the above title. His cbnclusions may be-briefly slated as follows: that such a decree of a competent court having jurisdiction of the person of the defendant creates a personal obligation upon the defendant which a court of equity at the situs should enforce just as it would a contract or trust concerning this land made in the foreign jurisdiction: and that, as between the States of this Union, the "full faith and credit" clause of the Constitution makes such enforcement of the foreign decree obligatory. …