Case ID: la_151/html/0717-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "ST. PAUL, J.", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

(92 South. 311)
    No. 24858.
    FOSTER et al. v. PEET et al.
    (May 1, 1922.
    Rehearing Denied by Division A June 5, 1922.)
    
      (Syllabus by the Court.)
    
    1. Courts &wkey;>224(9) — Appeal transferred when jurisdictional allegation is mere conclusion, and unwarranted by the facts.
    Where the allegation made, by appellants, for purposes of appellate jurisdiction, that the amount involved exceeds $2,000 (the lower limit of this court), is a mere conclusion, and unwarranted by the facts and circumstances of the case, the appeal will be transferred to the appellate court having jurisdiction.
    
      (Additional Syllabus by Editorial Staff.)
    
    2. Courts c&wkey;224(l I) — Amount in dispute held insufficient to give Supreme Court jurisdic" tion.
    In a suit by members of a local union to enjoin the officers from putting in force a new constitution, increasing dues and raising president’s salary, the amount involved was insufficient to give the Supreme Court jurisdiction where the increase in plaintiffs’ dues amounted to only $96 a year, and their share of the increase in salary to less than $50 a year.
    Appeal from Civil District Court, Parish of Orleans; H. C. Cage, Judge.
    Action by Joseph W. Foster and others against Sylvester Peet and others. From a judgment rejecting plaintiffs’ demand, they appeal.
    Appeal transferred to the Court of Appeal.
    
      W. O. Jones, of New Orleans, for appellants.
    B. B. Howard, of New Orleans, for appellees. '
    
    By Division C, composed of Justices DAW-KINS, ST. PAUL, and THOMPSON.
   ST. PAUL, J.

The plaintiffs are 16 in number, out of 455 members of a local union; about one-thirtieth of its total membership. They have enjoined the officers thereof from promulgating and putting in force a new constitution, on the ground that the same was illegally adopted; and they allege . that the amount involved exceeds $2,-000.

From a judgment dissolving their injunction, and rejecting their demand, they appeal to this court, the lower limit of whose appellate jurisdiction is $2,000.

The only pecuniary interest which they show herein is that the new constitution raises the dues of each member 50 cents a month, or $6 per year, and raises the president’s salary from $10 per month to $30 per week.

It will therefore be seen that the share and contribution of the 16 plaintiffs in and to the increase in the president’s salary amounts to less than $1 per week, or $50 per year, and that the sum of the increase in their dues amounts to $96 per year, in all $146 per year.

At that rate any litigation over the validity vel non of the new constitution would have to last some 14 years before these plaintiffs would all together be affected to the extent of $2,000.

When the litigation was begun (April 15, 1921) there was not the least probability that such litigation would last even as long as two years; nor is there now. And hence the allegation that the amount involved exceeds $2,000 is a mere conclusion on the part of plaintiffs, which is unwarranted by the facts and circumstances of the case. Accordingly we will transfer their appeal to the court where it properly belongs.

Incidentally it may be mentioned that the injunction issued herein on a bond for only $250, and that the suspensive appeal was taken by plaintiffs on a bond for only $200.

Decree.

It is therefore ordered that this appeal be transferred to the Court, of Appeal for the Parish of Orleans, provided the same be lodged in said court before the expiration of 15 days after this decree becomes final; the appellants to pay the costs of this court, and all other costs to abide the final result.

Rehearing refused by Division A, composed of Chief Justice PROVOSTY and Justices OVERTON and LECHE.