New Orleans v. Fisher/Opinion of the Court

by Melville Fuller

United States Supreme Court

180 U.S. 185

New Orleans  v.  Fisher

 Argued: October 12, 1900. --- Decided: January 28, 1901

Fourteen errors were assigned in the circuit court of appeals, which were considered and disposed of seriatim. Many of these alleged errors raised questions not within the exceptions to the master's report, and, in any view, we think the case may be determined without minutely retraversing the ground.

Mrs. Fisher and her husband recovered judgment against the board of school directors in the state district court May 22, 1890, which, on appeal, was affirmed by the supreme court. Fisher v. New Orleans Directors of City Schools, 44 La. Ann. 184, 10 So. 494.

February 23, 1892, Mrs. Fisher and husband brought an action against the school board on the judgment so recovered, in the circuit court of the United States for the eastern district of Louisiana. The petition set forth that Mr. and Mrs. Fisher were citizens of the Kingdom of Spain, and that the judgment sued on was recovered on certain claims for school teachers' salaries, including Mrs. Fisher herself. An exception was filed to the jurisdiction of the court on the ground that the assignors of the school warrants held by Mrs. Fisher as assignee could not have sued in that court. The matter was submitted to a jury, and a verdict returned in plaintiffs' favor, whereupon the exception was overruled, and afterwards the case went to judgment payable out of the school taxes levied prior to 1879. This judgment was rendered May 19, 1892, and on May 11, 1896, the present bill, in the nature of a creditors' bill, was filed on behalf of Mrs. Fisher, joined and authorized by her husband (setting up that judgment and others), and of all others similarly situated, to compel an accounting for their benefit by the city in respect of the school taxes levied prior to 1879, and the interest thereon, collected and not paid over to the school board, as a trust fund for the payment of the expenses of the public schools, it being averred that the school board had refused to require such accounting.

After demurrer filed and overruled, the city answered, admitting the recovery of the judgments as alleged; that they had become final; and that they were payable as provided therein; and denying that the school taxes collected constituted a trust fund; any liability for interest collected; any privity between Mrs. Fisher and the city; and pleading prescription by the lapse of ten years.

The cause was referred to a master, who reported certain amounts of school taxes, and of interest on school taxes, collected by the city. The city filed exceptions to the conclusions of the master that the city was indebted to the school board for interest collected; and that the amount reported as collected out of the school taxes from 1871 to 1878 inclusive was due by the city to the school board 'at any time since its collection.'

The facts are not in controversy, and the questions raised, or attempted to be raised, are questions of law.

The bill invoked the ordinary exercise of equity jurisdiction in this class of cases. The school taxes collected were held in trust by the city, and, as the school board declined to require an accounting, these creditors, whose claims were payable out of the taxes, were entitled to the interposition of a court of equity to reach the fund. The suggestion of want of privity between complainants and the city, as defeating the jurisdiction, is without merit. Nor is the defense of the statute of limitations well founded.

The judgments were rendered since 1890, and were made payable out of these taxes; the school certificates were merged in these judgments; and this bill was filed within ten years.

As between the city and the school board, the city did not hold these collections in her own right. The possession of the one was the possession of the other; the possession of the city was precarious, and not animo domini; and being trustee she could not acquire the trust fund by lapse of time. There was no adverse possession in repudiation of the fiduciary relation. Oliver v. Piatt, 3 How. 411, 11 L. ed. 657; New Orleans v. Warner, 175 U.S. 130, 44 L. ed. 102, 20 Sup. Ct. Rep. 44.

After the master's report and the exceptions thereto had been filed, the city undertook to raise the question of the jurisdiction of the circuit court on the ground of the want of competency in the assignors of Mrs. Fisher to sue in that court, and of want of diversity of citizenship between Mrs. Fisher and the city. The first of these objections had been made and, after trial, overruled in the proceedings which resulted in the judgment of May 19, 1892. The petition in that case also alleged that Mrs. Fisher and her husband were citizens of Spain. The judgment was conclusive on both points, and not open to impeachment as to either collaterally or on a creditors' bill. Mattingly v. Nye, 8 Wall. 373, 19 L. ed. 381; Evers v. Watson, 156 U.S. 533, 39 L. ed. 522, 15 Sup. Ct. Rep. 430; Laing v. Rigney, 160 U.S. 539, 40 L. ed. 527, 16 Sup. Ct. Rep. 366.

On July 1, 1897, a plea to the jurisdiction of the court in this case because Mrs. Fisher was a citizen of Louisiana was put upon the files without leave of court, and was stricken off as irregular on December 20. This action of the court is not open to review, and as this bill was merely ancillary the plea was immaterial. Root v. Woolworth, 150 U.S. 413, 37 L. ed. 1126, 14 Sup. Ct. Rep. 136.

The city on the same day, December 20, applied for leave to file a plea alleging that Mrs. Fisher was a citizen of Louisiana at the time the original action was brought in the circuit court, and had so continued down to the filing of the bill; that she had fraudulently otherwise represented; and that the city had no information of the facts until after the exceptions to the master's report were filed, which was on the 7th of June. This application was denied by the circuit court, and it is impossible for us to say that in this ruling the court abused its discretion.

This was not the proper way to attack the original judgment on the ground of fraud; nothing was said in the proposed plea as to the citizenship of Mr. Fisher, who was a party plaintiff, and a necessary or at least proper party, if the choses in action sued on were community property, and even if paraphernal (La. Civil. Code, §§ 2402, 2404, 2385); and the record, so far from indicating fraud, showed that Mr. Fisher was an alien, being a subject of the British Crown residing at Cuba, which had led to a mistake of counsel in framing the pleadings.

It may be added that there was nothing in the case bringing it within the exceptional rule applied in Lawrence Mfg. Co. v. Jamesville Cotton Mills, 138 U.S. 552, 34 L. ed. 1005, 11 Sup. Ct. Rep. 402, relied on by counsel.

The city excepted to the inclusion of the interest on school taxes collected by the city with the school taxes collected, as part of the amount for which the city was liable.

The circuit court of appeals disposed of this point in these words:

'Under the law, the school taxes carried 10 per cent interest per annum from the day they became delinquent. It was a penalty for nonpayment of the taxes. This interest, or penalty, for delayed payment of school taxes, formed no part of the city's proper revenues. The city in collecting the same was acting as a trustee for the school board. Delay in payment of taxes operated to the prejudice, not of the city, but of the school fund and its creditors. We are unable to find any authority in law or morals for the city to appropriate to itself this interest. To allow such an appropriation would be to reward the city for its own negligence in the collection of the taxes due the school fund. We fully agree with the master that 'the interest, as a mere accessory of the principal, belongs to the same person to whom the principal belongs." 34 C. C. A. 24, 63 U.S. App. 472, 91 Fed. Rep. 583.

We concur in this view, and are, moreover, of opinion that the city, having made such collections, cannot now be permitted to escape liability therefor on the suggestion that school taxes are not within the terms of the statute inflicting the penalty on 'all taxes imposed by the city of New Orleans.' Acts La. 1871, No. 48, § 9.

The only other matter necessary to be referred to is the allowance of interest. The circuit court by its amended decree gave interest on the larger sum found due from the date of the decree. The circuit court of appeals modified that decree so as to award interest on the sum of $71,139.60, collected prior to January 24, 1881, from the latter date, and on the item of $799.18, reported by the master May 8, 1897, as having been collected after January 24, 1881, from the date of the report.

The bill did not charge the city with any wilful default, nor did it appear therefrom when the school board was requested to demand an accounting. The bringing of the bill amounted to such demand, and it was filed May 11, 1896, and the appearance of the city entered June 1.

The city occupied the position of agent of the school board to collect and pay over school taxes, as held in Labatt v. New Orleans, 38 La. Ann. 283, yet it may fairly be said that, under the legislation upon the subject, it was not the duty of the city to pay the money over immediately, but only as occasion might arise, and that, as no charge of fraudulent conversion was made, interest would not commence to run until after failure to pay when required to do so, or failure to account on demand.

Where interest is sought by way of damages for delay, courts of equity exercise a certain discretion as to its allowance.

In view of the acquiescence of the school board in the retention by the city of the interest collected on school taxes, an acquiescence in good faith so far as appears; the attitude of the city as a public corporation; and the lack of averment or evidence of demand prior to the filing of the bill, or of effort to compel an accounting-we think that interest should not be allowed in this case prior to May 11, 1896.

The decree of the circuit court of appeals eals, rendered May 1, 1900, affirming a decree of the circuit interest on the sum of $71,139.60 from May 11, 1896, and on the sum of $799.18 from May 8, 1897, and as so modified is affirmed with costs; and the cause is remanded to the circuit court with a direction to amend its decree in the particulars above specified, it being affirmed as so modified.

Mr. Justice Peckham and Mr. Justice McKenna took no part in the consideration and disposition of the case.

Notes