Lum v. Fauntleroy

Terral, I., delivered the opinion of the court. Until the supreme court of the United States shall expressly so. declare we will not hold that a contract condemned by our civil and criminal laws as immoral, and which the courts of this state are prohibited from enforcing, is sanctified and purged of its legality by a judgment rendered in another state against a citizen of this state, sued and served with process on being found temporarily in the jurisdiction of the court, so that in a suit here on such judgment the illegal character of the cause of action may not be inquired into. There are decisions of the supreme court which seem to hold that it is not allowable to go behind the judgment for the purpose of examining into the validity of the claim, but we are unwilling to believe that it will ever be held that a court is precluded by the constitution of the United States from ascertaining whether the claim on which a judgment is rendered in another state is such an one as the courts of the state in which suit on the judgment is brought, on grounds of public policy, are expressly prohibited from enforcing. If this be law, all that is necessary to free the most corrupt transaction from all objection is to obtain service on a party and get judgment in another state, and then come into a court of this state and obtain judgment, by virtue of art. 4, sec. 1, constitution of the United States and the act of [764] congress in pursuance of it. It is true the suit in Missouri was on an award of arbitrators, but the matter submitted as averred by the plea was a claim based on a gambling contract in “futures,” and the illegality of the transaction was not involved in the submission, and, therefore, was not, if it could be, concluded by the award. The second replication to the plea of defendant does not controvert the allegation of the plea as to its averment that the illegality of the transaction was not involved in the arbitration, and we interpret this replication as merely intended to invoke.the constitution of the United States as precluding inquiry into the nature of the cause of action on which judgment was rendered. This question had been raised' by the demurrer to the plea, which the court overruled, and the second replication was no more than calling in question at a later stage of the case the correctness of the former ruling. We approve the former ruling, believing that the plea presents a bar to the action. Reversed and remanded.