Source: https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/236/311/
Timestamp: 2019-04-23 02:13:33+00:00

Document:
Where there is a joint cause of action against defendants resident of plaintiff's state and a nonresident defendant, in order to make the case removable as to the latter because of the dismissal as to the former, the discontinuance as to the resident defendants must have been the voluntary act of the plaintiff and have so taken the resident defendants out of the case as to leave the controversy one wholly between the plaintiff and the nonresident defendant.
nonsuit as against them with leave to set it aside, the case is not then ended as against those defendants, nor is it until after affirmance by the appellate court or the expiration of plaintiff's time to appeal; the controversy does not become one solely between the plaintiff and the other defendants, and even if the latter are nonresidents of plaintiff's state, the case is not removable as to them. Powers v. Chesapeake & Ohio Ry., 169 U. S. 92, distinguished.
The facts, which involve questions regarding removal from the state to the federal court where the cause of action has been dismissed after trial as to all the defendants, resident of the same state as plaintiff, are stated in the opinion.
omitted to instruct and require their employees to so mark cars under and about which other employees were engaged in work that all persons would know whether employees were working under such cars, negligently omitted to notify Kettelhake that defendants were about to move the car under which he was working, negligently omitted to discover that Kettelhake was under and repairing the car, and negligently caused the wheels and trucks of the car under which he was working to run over him.
Car Company filed its petition for removal and bond, which petition for removal was denied, to which denial the Car Company then and there excepted. At the same term, and within four days after the nonsuits as to defendants Martin and Eilers were taken, and during the same term that the verdict and judgment were rendered, plaintiff filed separate motions praying the court to overrule the order theretofore made overruling plaintiff's motion to set aside said nonsuits and reinstate the cause, and praying the court to grant plaintiff a new trial as to said defendants, which motions were overruled. Thereafter plaintiff filed her application and prayed an appeal as to the defendant Martin to the Supreme Court of Missouri, which appeal, by order of the court, duly entered of record, was allowed, and it is conceded that the matter appealed from is now pending in the Supreme Court of Missouri, and, so far as it appears, is undecided.
A verdict was rendered in favor of the plaintiff against the Car Company, and afterwards the case was taken to the Supreme Court of Missouri, which court held that it had no jurisdiction, and that the exclusive jurisdiction was in the St. Louis Court of Appeals, to which the cause was transferred. That court passed upon other questions to which it is not necessary to refer, and as to the right of removal held that the case was not a removable one. It is to that part of the judgment that this writ of error is taken.
controversy between the railroad company and the plaintiff. When the case was called for trial before a jury in the state court, the plaintiff discontinued his action against the individual defendants, and thereupon the railroad company filed a second petition for removal. That application was denied by the state court, but was granted by the circuit court of the United States, and the question was as to the propriety of the order of removal. It was held that, when the case was discontinued as to the defendants who were citizens of the same state with the plaintiff, the action became for the first time one against the railroad company alone, and therefore properly removable at that time.
In Kansas City &c. Ry. v. Herman, 187 U. S. 63, it was held that a case was not removable because the court had held that, as to a resident defendant, there was not sufficient evidence to warrant a verdict, and sustained a demurrer to the evidence. It was held that the ruling was on the merits and in invitum, and that there was nothing to show that the original joinder was in bad faith.
In Fritzlen v. Boatmen's Bank, 212 U. S. 364, the principle of the Powers case was applied, and it was held that an application for removal under the circumstances there shown was within time under the ruling in the Powers case.
In Lathrop, Shea & Henwood Co. v. Interior Construction & Improvement Co., 215 U. S. 246, it was held that, where the plaintiff insisted on the joint liability of the nonresident and resident defendants, the dismissal of the complaint on the merits as to the defendants who were citizens of the same state with the plaintiff did not make the case then removable, and did not prevent the plaintiff from taking a verdict against the defendants who might have removed the suit had they been sued alone, or had there originally been a separable controversy as to them.
"Under the evidence in this case, Martin is not liable, and in pursuance to that ruling, you take a nonsuit with leave to move to set the same aside; so that, in my opinion, he is still a party to the suit. Your motion to set aside the nonsuit might hereafter be granted, and then we would have a section of the suit in the United States court and a section here."
court, and when bond is given, the judgment for nonsuit is superseded, and can only become operative and enforceable in the event of its being affirmed by the appellate court. It is only when so affirmed that a plaintiff, in contemplation of the statute of Missouri (Rev.Stat. § 3239) can be said to suffer a nonsuit. The same practice was recognized in Nivert v. Railroad, 232 Mo. 626, and in Lewis v. Mining Co., 199 Mo. 463, 468.
We have examined the cases from the Supreme Court of Missouri relied upon by the plaintiff in error and we find nothing in them to militate against the conclusion reached in circumstances like those now presented. The ruling of the court sustaining the demurrer to the evidence interposed by the resident defendants practically determined the question of their liability, and, under the Missouri practice as we understand it, there was a right to take an involuntary nonsuit, with leave to move to set it aside, and when that motion was overruled, there was a remedy by appeal to the Supreme Court of Missouri, as was done in the present case, and the order is not final until the appellate court passes upon it.
We cannot agree to the contention that, upon this record, when the court had sustained the demurrers to the evidence as to Martin and Eilers, and plaintiff took the nonsuit, the case was so far terminated as between the plaintiff and the resident defendants as to leave a removable controversy wholly between the plaintiff and a nonresident corporation.
The element upon which the decision in the Powers case depended -- the voluntary dismissal and consequent conclusion of the suit in the state court as to the resident defendants -- is not present in this case.

References: v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 § 3239
 v. 
 v.