Source: https://caselaw.findlaw.com/us-supreme-court/155/482.html
Timestamp: 2019-04-19 17:26:22+00:00

Document:
This was an action brought November 4, 1892, in the circuit court of Montgomery county, in the state of Alabama, by the state of Alabama against the Postal Telegraph Cable Company, a corporation organized under the laws of the state [155 U.S. 482, 483] of New York, to recover taxes and penalties claimed by the state of Alabama under its statute of February 28, 1889, No. 103.
By that statute, it is enacted that 'all express and telegraph and sleeping-car companies, doing business between points wholly within this state, and without reference to their interstate business, shall pay in advance on the first day of January, in each year, to the auditor of the state of Alabama, a privilege tax of five hundred dollars, together with one dollar for each mile of telegraph line, or of railroad tracks, on or along which the lines of said companies operate or extend: and no express or telegraph company, which has paid the privilege tax hereby required, shall be liable to pay any other privilege or other tax in this state, except licenses required by cities and towns, and except upon their real estate, fixtures and other property, which shall be taxed at the same rate as is now levied and collected upon other property in this state: provided, that all express or telegraph companies, which have heretofore paid their taxes to the state under existing laws, for the year 1889, are hereby exempt from the provisions of this clause for said year: And provided further, that all telegraph companies, whose lines on which business is done wholly within the state do not exceed 150 miles, shall pay, at the same time and in the same manner and for the same purpose, a privilege tax at the rate of one dollar a mile for each mile of railroad along or upon which they operate or do business, and no more: And provided further, that said company, or some agent thereof, shall, when making payment of the tax hereinbefore mentioned, report under oath the mileage of railroad operated by them respectively; and, in default of the payment of said tax, or the making of said report, for sixty days after maturity of said tax, a penalty of double the amount of the same shall be imposed on such defaulting companies.' Acts Ala. 1888-89, p. 89.
The second and third counts were precisely like the first, except that the second substituted January 1, 1891, for January 1, 1890; and that the third substituted January 1, 1892, and alleged that the defendant operated its lines on or along 328 miles of railroad track, and became liable to pay to the plaintiff a penalty of $1,656.
In May, 1893, the defendant filed in the circuit court of the United States an answer, setting up substantially the same facts as in its petition for removal.
In January, 1894, the plaintiff filed an amended complaint, claiming for each of the years 1890, 1891, and 1892 a privilege tax of $500, and a penalty of $1,816; and the defendant filed an answer, similar to its original answer, and admitting the [155 U.S. 482, 486] number of miles of telegraph line owned by it within the state.
In February, 1894, the parties submitted the case to the judgment of the court upon an agreed statement of facts, in which the facts set up in the answer were admitted. The court thereupon gave judgment for the plaintiff for the sum of $3,846.20, and the defendant sued out this writ of error.
T. Moultrie Mordecai and P. H. Gadsden, for plaintiff in error.
Wm. L. Martin, Ala. Atty. Gen.
By section 1 of the act of congress of March 3, 1875 (chapter 137), as amended by that acts of March 3, 1887 (chapter 373), and August 13, 1888 (chapter 866), it is enacted that the circuit courts of the United States shall have original cognizance, concurrent with the courts of the several states, of all suits of a civil nature, at common law or in equity, where the matter in dispute exceeds, exclusive of interest and costs, the sum or value of $2,000, 'and arising under the constitution or laws of the United States, or treaties made, or which shall be made, under their authority; or in which controversy the United States are plaintiffs or petitioners; or in which there shall be a controversy between citizens of different states'; 'or a controversy between citizens of the same state claiming lands under grants of different states; or a controversy between citizens of a state and foreign states, citizens or subjects.' And by section 2 the defendant's right to remove a suit-whether arising under the constitution, laws, or treaties of the United States or coming within any other class above enumerated-from a state court into the circuit court of the United States is restricted to suits 'of which the circuit courts of the United States are given original jurisdiction by the preceding section.' 25 Stat. 434. [155 U.S. 482, 487] The grounds upon which the present suit was removed from a court of the state of Alabama into the circuit court of the United States were that the controversy therein arose under the constitution and laws of the United States, and that it was wholly between citizens of different states.
But the suit was one brought by the state to recover taxes and penalties imposed by its own revenue laws, the jurisdiction over which belongs to its own tribunals, except so far as congress, in order to secure the supremacy of the national constitution and laws, has provided for a removal into the courts of the United States. Wisconsin v. Pelican Ins. Co., 127 U.S. 265, 290 , 8 S. Sup. Ct. 1370; Huntington v. Attrill, 146 U.S. 657, 672 , 13 S. Sup. Ct. 224. And the complaint by which the suit was begun did not mention the constitution or any law of the United States, or claim any right under either.
A state is not a citizen. And under the judiciary acts of the United States it is well settled that a suit between a state and a citizen or a corporation of another state is not between citizens of different states, and that the circuit court of the United States has no jurisdiction of it, unless it arises under the constitution, laws, or treaties of the United States. Ames v. Kansas, 111 U.S. 449 , 4 Sup. Ct. 437; Stone v. South Carolina, 117 U.S. 430 , 6 Sup. Ct. 799; Germania Ins. Co. v. Wisconsin, 119 U.S. 473 , 7 Sup. Ct. 260.
It is equally well settled that under the provisions, above referred to, of the existing act of congress, no suit can be removed by a defendant from a state court into the circuit court of the United States as one arising under the constitution, laws, or treaties of the United States, unless the fact that it so arises appears by the plaintiff's statement of his own claim; and that a deficiency in his statement, in this respect, cannot be supplied by allegations in the petition for removal, or in subsequent pleadings in the case. Tennessee v. Bank of Commerce, 152 U.S. 454 , 14 Sup. Ct. 654; Chappell v. Waterworth, 155 U.S. 102 , 15 Sup. Ct. 34.
The conclusion is inevitable that the judgment of the circuit court of the United States must be reversed, and the case remanded to that court, with directions to remand it to the state court; and that, the case having been wrongfully [155 U.S. 482, 488] removed into the circuit court of the United States by the Postal Telegraph Cable Company, that company must pay the costs in that court, as well as in this court. Tennessee v. Bank of Commerce, above cited; Hanrick v. Hanrick, 153 U.S. 192 , 14 Sup. Ct. 835.

References: v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v.