The representative. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1893-1901, 1893-09-06
THE TRAMP CORPORATION.

1O1CISu COI pOI dUIOu OuS dSCu LII COlH-
merce.
THE TRAMP CORPORATION.
Under this Infamous usurp-
alton of jurisdiction it has come to
this, that citizens of Kansas can
organize in New Jersey, or in West
Virginia, or in some other state,
what is known as "tram corpora
tiOa'' to do business wholly within
the state of Kansas; and yet when
this tramp corporation is sued in a
court of the state of Kansas by a
citizen of Kansas, if the amount in
controversy exceeds $4,000, the cause
is removable to a Federal court.
What is worse than this, single
citizen of Kansas, with two or three
dummy shareholders, each nominally
owning one share but really owning
none, himself in point of fact the
sole shareholder, can organize a
tramp corporation in another state
Ii
Kansas, and in this way can defeat
your state courts of their jurisdic-
tion and litigate every matter above
$4,000 with citizens of Kansas in the
Federal courts. This is no imagi-
native picture. The country saoarnas
acith corporations haviag but one real
shareholder. l am personally &C
Quainted with some of them. The
Jurisdiction of the state courts is
every day defeated, under the intol-
cradle fiction which I have already
named, by persons who have thus
become Incorporated. Some citizens
of New York recently organized one
of these tramp corporations" in the
State of West Virginia to do bust
ness wholly within the state Of New
York. They incurred liability in the
state of New York, founded in tort,
and were sued as partners, on the
theory that what they had done was
fraud upon the corporation laws
of New York. But the Court of Ap-
peals of New York held that it was
good corporation under the laws of
New York and within the state of
New York, and that the co-adven-
turers were not liable as partners.
Under the decisions of the supreme
court of the United States this cor
poration was conclusively presumed
to be citizen of West Virginia. If
engaged in commerce" it could not
be kept out of the state of New
York by the laws of that state, or
by the people of that state. If sued
by citizen of that state, in court
of that state, for more than $4,000,
the cause was removable to the Cir
cult court of the United States.
GROWTH OF FEDERAL JUDICIAL
USURPATION.
l say, speaking to an audience of
lawyers, mindful of their conservative
tendencies and traditions, mindful
of their respect for the decisions of
the courts, which respect [ do not
wish to abate, that the decisions of
the Supreme Federal Tribunal which
created this jurisdiction were an
o1JaitJatl interpretation of the consti
tuition and of the judiciary Act;
that judges of the court who con-
CURED in that Interpretation k',e,o
that such was not the meaning of
those instruments intended by their
trainers; that they did not intend,
in placing that Interpretation upon
those instruments, to carry out the
fundamental canon of interpreter
tion, which is faithfully to ascertain
the meaning of the author of the
instrument and to give effect to that
meaning; but that they consciously
intended to seize upon a jurisdiction
which they did not rightfully pos
sess. Men are greedy of power;
judges are but men; and one of the
most pitiable illustrations of this
trait of human nature is that courts
are greedy of Jurisdiction. And
when you have a court that is SUI
preme in every sense of the word;
above which there is no superintend
ing tribunal; you have a tribunal
which, in obedience to this trait of
human character, forever proceeds
in one direction by one seizure after
another of jurisdiction, so that it
threatens ultimately the results pre-
dicted by Mr.. Jefferson, Of absorbing
to itself all the powers of govern
ment. Power unopposed continually
advances in it's own ACKNOWLEDGMENT.
Why need 1t give just and sensible