Opinion · Supreme Court of the United States
North American Transportation & Trading Co. v. Morrison
N. Am. Transp. & Trading Co. v. Morrison, 178 U.S. 262 (1900)
- Type
- Opinion
- Court
- Supreme Court of the United States
- Jurisdiction
- Federal
- Date
- 1900-05-21
- Topic
- general
Mr: Justice Shiras, after stating the case, delivered the opinion of the court. This is a suit'by Donald Morrison, alleging himself to be a citizen of the State of Minnesota, against the North American *266 Transportation and Trading Company, a corporation of the State of Illinois, for damages arising out of a breach of a contract whereby the transportation company had agreed to carry the plaintiff and his baggage from Seattle in the State of Washington to Dawson City in the Northwest Territory, in the Dominion of Canada. It is conceded that the defendant company failed, without sufficient excuse, to fulfill its engagement, and the question upon which the jurisdiction of the court below depended is as to the nature and amount of the damages to which the plaintiff is entitled. The allegations in the complaint in that respect were, first, the sum paid by the plaintiff as a fare being $200; second, the expenses caused by having to return to Seattle, amounting to $72.50; third, the wages which he could and would have earned at Seattle if he had not proceeded upon the attempted journey, being wages at the rate of three dollars per day during all the time intervening between August 3, 1897, and November 17, 1897, amounting to about $320; fourth, the loss of a certain portion of plaintiff’s baggage, amounting to $29.25 ; and, fifth, the loss occasioned plaintiff by the defendant’s failure to transport him to Dawson City, “ where the plaintiff could have obtained employment and engag…
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Headnotes
- Federal Courts & Jurisdiction — Diversity Jurisdiction Although the amount claimed in a plaintiff's declaration ordinarily determines the jurisdictional amount in suits for unliquidated damages, where the plaintiff asserts a claim that he cannot legally be permitted to sustain by evidence, a mere ad damnum clause will not confer jurisdiction on the Circuit Court; the court may dismiss the suit on motion, on demurrer, or of its own motion. 178 U.S. 262, 267
- Remedies — Breach of Contract — Remote and Speculative Profits A carrier that breaches its contract of carriage cannot be held liable for the wages or profits a passenger suggests he might have earned at the point of destination where the passenger alleges no prior residence, engagement, business, or promise of employment there, does not allege his occupation before departure or the occupation expected at the destination, and does not allege that any expected occupation was communicated to the carrier; such anticipations of employment are too remote and uncertain to support an award of damages. 178 U.S. 262, 267-268
- Federal Courts & Jurisdiction — Diversity Jurisdiction Where it is not alleged that the assignors themselves could have prosecuted suit in the Circuit Court, the settled construction of the United States statutes bars the assignee from maintaining the suit there, and the assignee cannot add claims assigned by parties whose citizenship and residence do not appear, in order to obtain federal jurisdiction over his own cause of action. 178 U.S. 262, 269-272
NORTH AMERICAN c. CO.v. MORRISON,178 U.S. 262(1900)
20 S.Ct. 869
NORTH AMERICAN TRANSPORTATION TRADING COMPANYv. MORRISON.
ERROR TO THE CIRCUIT COURT OF THE UNITED STATES FOR THE DISTRICT OF
WASHINGTON.
No. 203.
Submitted March 20, 1900.
Decided May 21, 1900.
THIS was an action originally brought in December, 1897, in
the Superior Court of the State of Washington for King County, by
Donald Morrison against the North American Transportation and
Trading Company, and subsequently, on petition of the defendant
company, removed to the Circuit Court of the United States for
the District of Washington. To the declaration, containing
several counts, the defendant demurred. The demurrer was
overruled, and the cause was tried before the District Judge and
a jury. After verdict and judgment in favor of the plaintiff, the
District Judge certified the following statement of facts and
questions of jurisdiction to this court:
"I, C.H. Hanford, District Judge, presiding in the Circuit
Court aforesaid, and the judge before whom the above-entitled
cause was tried, do now, on the 29th day of December, 1898, being
the December term, at which the judgment and verdict were entered
herein, certify as follows:
"Morrison, the plaintiff, alleging himself to be a citizen and
resident of the State of Minnesota, began this action in the
Superior Court of King County, State of Washington, against the
defendant, alleging it to be a corporation organized and existing
Page 263
under the laws of the State of Illinois, and engaged in business
in the State of Washington. The suit was upon eight causes of
action, the first on plaintiff's own account, the other on
account of seven alleged assignors of plaintiff. The citizenship
of these assignors was nowhere alleged.
"Defendant removed the case to this court on the ground of
diversity of citizenship between it and plaintiff Morrison, and
the involving of a sum exceeding two thousand dollars, exclusive
of interest and costs. After removal defendant demurred to each
cause of action in the complaint as not sufficient to constitute
a cause of action, and as to the last seven causes of action on
the additional ground that the court had no jurisdiction to hear
it, and this was overruled, with exception to defendant. Issue
was then joined, and, after two trials, judgment was entered as
now complained of in error in the sum of $2119.50. After the
verdict and before judgment defendant moved to dismiss or remand
the whole cause and each cause of action on the ground that as to
the first cause of action it did not involve two thousand
dollars, exclusive of interest and costs, and as to the second
and each subsequent cause of action — that is to say, as to the
assigned causes of action — that each of these did not involve
two thousand dollars, exclusive of interest and costs, and
because, also, it did not appear that proper diversity of
citizenship existed at the time of the commencement of the
action, or at the time of its removal, between the assignors of
plaintiff and defendant so as to confer jurisdiction upon the
Federal court; which said motion to dismiss and remand was
denied, with exception to defendant.
"The original complaint shows that the aggregate sum sued for
by Morrison was $18,173.50, divided, as already stated, into
eight causes of action. The suit was upon eight contracts of
carriage, between defendant as a carrier and plaintiff and his
seven assignors, from Seattle to Dawson City, by way of St.
Michaels and the Yukon River, which contracts were alleged to
have been broken by the carrier by failure and refusal to
transport the passengers farther than Fort Yukon on the river.
"The first cause of action — that of plaintiff himself —
alleged himself to be a citizen and a resident of Minnesota and
defendant
Page 264
a corporation organized and existing under the laws of the State
of Illinois. The contract was alleged to have been made at
Seattle on the 30th day of July, 1897, and the agreed date of the
delivery of the plaintiff at Dawson by the carrier was alleged to
be September 15, 1897, and this suit was brought on the 17th day
of November, 1897. On the breach of the contract at Fort Yukon,
plaintiff alleged himself compelled to return to Seattle. The
damages claimed by him were as follows: (a) The price of his
ticket from Seattle to Dawson City, $200.00; (b) $72.50,
returning to Seattle after the breach of contract at Fort Yukon;
(c) expense of one dollar a day and loss of time at three
dollars a day at Seattle since his return there, the 18th day of
October, 1897; (d) three dollars a day from the 30th day of
July, 1897, which he could have earned if he had not started on
the journey at all; (e) fifteen dollars a day which he could
have earned for a year at Dawson after the 15th day of September,
1897; (f) lost baggage, $29.50; the total prayer of this cause
of action being $2301.75.
"The second and subsequent causes of action, being the
assigned causes, arose on exactly similar contracts of carriage.
The citizenship of the respective assignors was not averred. The
damages claimed were exactly the same as those claimed by
plaintiff himself, excepting that none of the assignors claimed
the item of lost baggage, and that the item of cost in returning
from Fort Yukon to Seattle was as low as $61.50 in some
instances, and as high as $103.25 in others. The lowest sum
claimed by any of the assignors as his total damage was $2261.25,
and the highest claimed was $2303.25.
"Neither in the original nor the assigned causes of action was
it alleged that any of these passengers had ever lived in Dawson
before, had any previous engagement or business there, or any
promise of employment, the allegation in each cause of action as
to the passenger's damage in this respect being that `he could
have obtained employment and engaged in business by him competent
to perform and transact at or about said Dawson City, and thereby
secured wages and profits at the rate of fifteen dollars per day
continuously from September 15, 1897, for the period of the year
thence next ensuing,' and that `he
Page 265
has wholly lost all of said employment and time, and all of said
wages and profits, to his damage in the sum of $2000.' It was not
alleged what, if any, occupation either plaintiff or any of his
assignors had before departure on the journey, nor was it alleged
what occupation was expected at the point of destination, or that
any expected occupation was communicated to the defendant.
"Now, therefore, I do certify to the Supreme Court the
following question of jurisdiction, as follows:
"Whether the motions to dismiss and to remand should have been
granted because at the time of removal to this court the cause
was one of which this court could not take jurisdiction — that is
to say, whether —
"(a) In each of the causes of action the sum or value of the
matter actually in dispute, as shown in the pleadings was less
than two thousand dollars, exclusive of interest and costs, and a
controversy was involved substantially within the jurisdiction of
this court; and whether —
"(b) If the foregoing be answered in the affirmative, the
amounts claimed in the assigned causes of action could be united
to that in the first to make up the jurisdictional amount, the
citizenship of the assignors not being alleged; and whether —
"(c) Supposing the jurisdictional amount was sufficient in
each cause of action, the case was even then removable to this
court when the necessary diversity of citizenship was alleged
only in the first cause of action, and was not alleged in those
assigned."
It is conceded that the defendant company failed, without sufficient excuse, to fulfill its engagement, and the question upon which the jurisdiction of the court below depended is as to the nature and amount of the damages to which the plaintiff is entitled. The allegations in the complaint in that respect were, first, the sum paid by the plaintiff as a fare being $200; second, the expenses caused by having to return to Seattle, amounting to $72.50; third, the wages which he could and would have earned at Seattle if he had not proceeded upon the attempted journey, being wages at the rate of three dollars per day during all the time intervening between August 3, 1897, and November 17, 1897, amounting to about $320; fourth, the loss of a certain portion of plaintiff's baggage, amounting to $29.25; and, fifth, the loss occasioned plaintiff by the defendant's failure to transport him to Dawson City, "where the plaintiff could have obtained employment and engaged in business which he was competent to perform and transact, at or about Dawson City, and thereby have secured wages and profits at the rate of fifteen dollars per day continuously from September 15, 1897, for the period of the year next ensuing;" "by reason whereof there is due and owing the plaintiff from the defendant by reason of the premises, for said expenditures, outlay and damages, the sum of two thousand three hundred and one dollars and seventy-five cents."
It was obvious, on the face of the plaintiff's complaint, that if he was not entitled to recover the money which he alleged "he could have earned and secured by obtaining employment and engaging in business at or about Dawson City," the amount necessary to give the Circuit Court jurisdiction was not involved.
While it has sometimes been said that it is the amount claimed by the plaintiff in his declaration that brings his case within the jurisdiction of the Circuit Court, that was in suits for unliquidatedPage 267damages, in which the amount which the plaintiff was entitled to recover was a question for the jury; an inspection of the declaration did not disclose and could not disclose but that the plaintiff was entitled to recover the amount claimed, and hence, even if the jury found a verdict in a sum less than the jurisdictional amount, the jurisdiction of the court would not be defeated.Barryv.Edmunds,116 U.S. 550;Scottv.Donald,165 U.S. 58,89.
But where the plaintiff asserts, as his cause of action, a claim which he cannot be legally permitted to sustain by evidence, a meread damnumclause will not confer jurisdiction on the Circuit Court, but the court on motion or demurrer, or of its own motion, may dismiss the suit. And such, we think, was the present case.
We do not consider it necessary to enter upon a discussion of the rule that a person is not to be held responsible in damages for the remote consequences of every negligent act, but only for those which are proximate or natural, and shall content ourselves by stating our conclusion that, in the circumstances disclosed by the plaintiff's declaration and in the certificate of the trial judge, the defendant company, though liable in a court of competent jurisdiction for the other claims asserted, cannot be held for the amount of wages or profits which the plaintiff suggests he might have earned had he reached Dawson City.
In the District Judge's certificate it is stated that the plaintiff did not allege that he had ever lived in Dawson City before, or had any previous engagement or business there or any promise of employment; that it was not alleged what, if any, occupation the plaintiff had before his departure on the journey, nor what occupation was expected at the point of destination, or that any expected occupation or employment was communicated to the defendant company.
The plaintiff was traveling to a land of promise, hoping to there procure some occupation, he knew not what, or to engage in some business, he knew not what. The result of such an adventure cannot be foretold, and the plaintiff's anticipations afford no safe ground on which to base a claim for damages.
If, then, the plaintiff in respect to his own claim, did not disclosePage 268a case of which the Circuit Court had jurisdiction, did he overcome that difficulty by the additional counts in which he alleged himself to be the assignee of several other voyagers who had suffered loss and damages similar to those claimed by him on his own behalf? The citizenship of the assignors was not alleged, and the greater portion of the respective claims consisted of matter which we have held in reference to plaintiff's own claim to be too remote and uncertain to be allowed.
It is somewhat uncertain, upon the facts alleged in the declaration and those stated to us in the certificate of the District Judge, whether if all the claims, as well those assigned and those held by the plaintiff in his own right, omitting those which we have held to be too remote and uncertain, were aggregated, they would reach the necessary jurisdictional amount. But however that may be, as it is not alleged that the assignors could have themselves prosecuted suit in the Circuit Court, it is the settled construction of the statutes of the United States that the suit cannot be maintained in favor of the assignee.Serev.Pitot, 6 Cranch, 332, was an action commenced to foreclose a mortgage given by a citizen of Louisiana to another citizen of the same State. The language of the judiciary act of 1789 was as follows: "Nor shall any District or Circuit Court have cognizance of any suit to recover the contents of any promissory note or other chose in action in favor of an assignee, unless a suit might have been prosecuted in such court to recover the said contents if no assignment had been made."1 Stat. 78. The plaintiff was the general assignee in insolvency of the mortgagor, and was an alien; and it was said by Chief Justice Marshall, delivering the opinion of the court:
"Without doubt assignable paper, being the chose in action most usually transferred, was in the mind of the legislature when the law was framed, and the words of the provision are, therefore, best adapted to that class of assignments. But there is no reason to believe that the legislature were not equally disposed to except from the jurisdiction of the Federal courts those who could sue in virtue of equitable assignments and those who could sue in virtue of legal assignments. The assignee of all the open accounts of a merchant might, under certain circumstances, bePage 269permitted to sue in equity in his own name, and there would be as much reason to exclude him from the Federal courts as to exclude the same person when the assignee of a particular note. The term `other chose in action' is broad enough to comprehend either case, and the word `contents' is too ambiguous in its import to restrain that general term. The contents of a note are the sums it shows to be due, and the same, without much violence to the language, can be said of an account."
And the same construction was put upon the language of the act of August 13, 1888, c. 866,25 Stat. 433.Mexican NationalRailroadv.Davidson,157 U.S. 201.
We do not think that it was competent for the plaintiff to add to his own cause of action, in order to obtain jurisdiction in the Circuit Court, claims assigned by those whose citizenship and residence did not appear either in the complaint or in the petition for removal. As, however, the plaintiff brought his action in the state court, where he was entitled to join the assigned claims with his own, and as the case was removed into the Federal court at the instance of the defendant company, whose motion to remand the case we are now obliged to sustain, we impose the costs in the Circuit Court and in this court on the North American Transportation and Trading Company, the plaintiff in error.
These views render it needless to answer severally the questions certified.Accordingly the judgment of the Circuit Court is reversed, andthe cause is remanded to that court, with directions to remandthe cause to the state court.Page 270