Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Railway Co v. Keokuk Northern Line Packet Co.

Mr. Chief Justice Sheldon delivered the opinion of the Court: ■ We will consider the case as properly presenting by the pleadings the question of the right to interplead in the suit in the capacity of receiver. The general doctrine that the powers of a receiver are coextensive only with the jurisdiction of the court making the appointment, and particularly that a foreign receiver should not be permitted, as against the claims of creditors resident in another State, to remove from such State the assets of the debtor, it being the policy of - every government to retain in its own hands the property of a debtor until all domestic claims against it have been satisfied, we fully concede; and were this the case of property situate in this State, never having been within the jurisdiction of the court that appointed the receiver, and never having been in the possession of the receiver, ‘it would be covered by the above principles, which would be decisive against the claim of the appellee. But the facts that the property at the time of the appointment of the receiver was within the jurisdiction of the court making the appointment, and was there taken into the actual possession of the receiver, and continued in his possession until it was attached, take the case, as we conceive, out of the range of the foregoing principles. We are of opinion that by the receiver’s taking possession of the barge in question within the jurisdiction of the court that appointed him, he became vested with a special property in the barge, like that which a sheriff acquires by the seizure of goods in execution, and that he was entitled to protect this special property while it continued, by action, in like manner as if he had been the absolute owner. Having taken the property in his possession, he was responsible for it to the court that appointed him, and had given a bond in a large sum to cover his responsibility as receiver, and to meet such liability he might maintain any appropriate proceeding to regain possession of the barge which had been taken from him. (Boyle v. Townes, 9 Leigh, 158; Singerly v. Fox, 75 Pa. 114.) It is well settled that • a sheriff does, by the seizure of goods in execution, acquire a special property in them, and that he may maintain trespass, trover or replevin for them. It is claimed that there was here an abandonment of the barge by leasing it and suffering it to be taken out of the State,—that the purpose in so doing was an unlawful one, and a gross violation of official duty. We do not so view it. The receiver was, by his appointment, authorized to manage the affairs of the corporation under the orders of the court. The business of the corporation was running boats on the Mississippi river, and chartering the barge for a trip up that river was but continuing the employ of the barge in the business of the corporation, and therefrom making an increase of the assets to’ be distributed among the creditors. Brownell v. Manchester, 1 Pick. 233, decides that a sheriff in- the State of Massachusetts, who had attached property in that State, did not lose his special property by removing the attached property into the State of Rhode Island for a lawful purpose. Dick v. Bailey et al. 2 La. Ann. 9 Jé, holds otherwise in respect to property attached in Mississippi, and sent by the sheriff into Louisiana for an illegal purpose. It is laid down in Drake on Attachment, (5th ed.) sec. 292, that the mere fact of removal by an officer of attached property beyond his bailiwick into a foreign jurisdiction, without regard to the circumstances attending it, will not dissolve the attachment; that if the purpose was lawful, and the possession continued, the attachment would not be dissolved; but if the purpose was unlawful, though the officer’s possession remained, or if lawful and he lost his possession, his special property in the goods would be divested,—citing the two eases above named. We do not consider that there was any unlawful purpose here in the chartering and employing of the barge, as was done. It is insisted the possession of the barge was lost. There was certainly evidence tending to show, possession by the receiver up to the time of the attachment, and in support of the judgment of the Appellate Court we must presume that it found the existence of all the facts necessary to sustain the judgment, where there was evidence tending to show their existence, and that court’s finding of fact is conclusive upon us. By taking the barge into his possession within the jurisdiction of the court that appointed him, a special property in the barge became vested in the receiver, and it is the established rule that whére a legal title to personal property has once passed and become vested in accordance with the law of the State where it is situated, the validity of such title will be recognized everywhere. Caniwell v. Sewell, 5 Hurl. & N. 728; Clark v. Connecticut Peat Co. 35 Conn. 303; Taylor v. Boardman, 25 Vt. 581; Crapo v. Kelly, 16 Wall. 610; Waters v. Barton, 1 Cold. (Tenn.) 450. Under this rule we hold that where a receiver has once obtained rightful possession of personal property situated within the jurisdiction of his appointment, which he was appointed to take charge of, he will not be deprived of its possession, though he take it, in the performance of his duty, into a foreign jurisdiction; that while there it can not be taken from his possession by creditors of the insolvent debtor who reside within that jurisdiction. Where a receiver of an insolvent manufacturing corporation, appointed by a court in New Jersey, took possession of its assets, and for the purpose of completing a bridge which it had contracted to build in Connecticut, purchased iron with the funds of the estate and sent it to that State, it was decided that the iron was not open to attachment in Connecticut by a creditor residing there. (Pond v. Cooke, 45 Conn. 126.) And where C. was appointed, by a court in Arkansas, receiver of property of T., a defendant in a suit, and ordered to ship it to Memphis for sale, and to hold the proceeds subject to the order of the court, and did so ship it to Memphis, where it was attached by creditors of T., it was held that C. could maintain an action of replevin for the property in. Tennessee. (Cagill v. Wooldridge, 8 Baxter, 580.) Kilmer v. Hobart, 58 How. Pr. 452, decides that receivers appointed in another State, and operating a railway as such, but having property in their hands as receivers in New York, can not there be sued,—that an attachment issued in such suit will be vacated. This is not the ease of the officer of a foreign court seeking, as against the claims of creditors resident here, to remove from this State assets of the debtor situate here at the time of the officer’s appointment, and ever since, and of which he had had no previous possession. It is to such a case as that, as we understand, that the authorities cited by appellant’s counsel apply, and not to a case like the present, where the property was, at the time of the appointment of the foreign receiver, within the jurisdiction of the appointing court, and there taken into the receiver’s possession, and subsequently suffered by him to be brought into this State in the performance of his duty, and his possession here wrongfully invaded, and he seeking but redress for such invasion. The judgment of the Appellate Court must be affirmed. Judgment affirmed.