Guaranty Trust Co. v. Galveston City R. Co.

SWAYNE, District Judge, after stating the facts as above, delivered the opinion of the court. It is difficult to understand upon what the appellee bases its right for an injunction in this case. In the suit for foreclosure, in which the receiver was appointed, appellant acted solely as a trustee for the bondholders, and its powers and status in that case was as such trustee only. It stands in the place of, and represents, the bondholders. It has no individual interest in the suit, further than the performance of its duties, as trustee; proceeding solely in a fiduciary capacity, and in the interest of those it represents. The relief sought by the Galveston City Railroad Company by its petition herein is against the appellant individually. It does not grow out of its connection with the foreclosure of the mortgage. The indebtedness of $50,000 occurred nearly a year before foreclosure suit was commenced. Seventy-five second mortgage bonds to another corporation as trustee were pledged as collateral security for this loan. Appellant was given a right, by the terms of the pledge, to sell this collateral upon default in the payment of the debt. In this transaction appellant was acting in its own interest, as a lender of money. Upon what principle can, it be claimed that its rights in respect to such transaction are in any way affected by the circumstance that it happened to be at the time a trustee named in a mortgage theretofore executed by the railroad company [815] to secure an issue of bonds held by others? The foreclosure was commenced and prosecuted by the bondholders through their representative. That controversy is wholly between the bondholders and the railroad company, and the controversy between the railroad company and the appeilant respecting this §50,000 loan is altogether foreign to the foreclosure proceedings. The bondholders are in no wise concerned in it, and their foreclosure proceedings cannot properly be modified or incumbered thereby. Neither does the charge made in the petition for injunction, that the foreclosure proceedings had impaired the value of the second mortgage bonds, have any effect on the rights of the appellant in this case. Its rights as the holder of the note and the collateral pledge to secure the same are wholly distinct from the right and action of the bondholders secured by the first mortgage now under foreclosure; and its right to proceed against the appellee upon its own claim could not be in any maimer impaired or prejudiced by the action taken by the holders of the first, mortgage bonds. Whatever position the second mortgage bonds might hold under other circumstances, their relation in this suit is that of a liability of the appellee, pledged to secure a debt to the appellant on a note which is overdue, and are not the bonds of some other corporation or person, owned by the railroad company, and subject to the control of the receiver. They are evidence of debt, not assets of the appellee. They have never been assets of the Galveston City Railroad Company. The right of appellant to sell the bonds pledged under the terms of the contract, and the powers confirmed by the terms of the pledge, were not in any way affected by the appointment of a receiver; nor were the position, character, or rights of the parties modified by the allegation that the appellants were the holders of the majority of the first mortgage bonds. The bonds may change hands; the trustee may be changed for cause; the receivership may extend for years. When, it might be asked, shall the appellant be permitted to realize on its collateral? The order granting the injunction is reversed, and the cause remanded, with instructions to the circuit court to dismiss the petition.