Source: https://caselaw.findlaw.com/us-supreme-court/108/436.html
Timestamp: 2019-04-22 16:15:53+00:00

Document:
Robert R. Bishop and John C. Gray, for appellees.
'TEMPORARY LOANS, CITY OF BOSTON.
'This certifies that, for value received, there will be due from the city of Boston, payable at the office of the city treasurer, on demand, after the first day of December next, to the general treasurer of the state of Rhode Island, or order, the sum of $100,000, with interest at the rate of 7 per cent. per annum, in current funds.
'This loan being authorized by an order of the city council passed the ninth day of June, 1869, to anticipate the income of the present financial year.
'Interest will not be allowed after this note is due.
- [108 U.S. 436, 444] That the directors and officers of the company, without consideration and without authority, deposited this certificate and obligation with the said Parker, who received the same without warrant of law, and thereupon held the same to the use of the railroad company; that the corporation never accepted the act of the legislature recited; that the railroad authorized thereby has never been built, nor any work done thereon, nor has the state of Rhode Island, nor any citizen thereof, suffered any damage or loss by reason thereof; that the general assembly of Rhode Island considered that the filing of the certificate and obligation of the city of Boston was not a compliance with the act, and did not ratify the taking of the same till after the bankruptcy of the railroad company; that said bankruptcy was adjudicated on October 21, 1870, and the complainants became assignees in bankruptcy of said company from that date, and entitled to the money represented by the said certificate; that Samuel Parker having died, the respondent Clark succeeded him as general treasurer of Rhode Island, and came into possession of the said certificate, which, it is alleged, however, he holds wrongfully, and in his individual and not his official capacity, and to the use of the complainants, but which, nevertheless, he thereatens to collect and withhold from them the proceeds thereof.
To this bill a demurrer was filed by Clark for want of jurisdiction, on the ground that it was, in substance, a suit by citizens of one state against the state of Rhode Island. This demurrer was overruled. Clark then filed his answer, denying the material allegations of the bill, asserting that the transaction was with the state of Rhode Island, through the treasurer in his official capacity, and insisting upon the immunity of the state from suit by citizens of other states as a defense. The cause came on for hearing upon the pleadings and proofs, when an interlocutory decree was passed, April 15, 1878, ordering the payment of the money due from the city of Boston upon the loan certificate into the registry of the court, with liberty to the defendant Clark to take and file evidence in support of any claim for damages by reason of the breach of the bond of the Boston, Hartford & Erie Railroad Company to the state of Rhode Island; and further ordering that on final hearing, and upon filing in court the certificate of indebtedness, the general treasurer of the state of Rhode Island should have and recover of the said sum in the registry such portion, or the whole thereof, as should amount to the sum, if any, for which any surety might or for which the principal obligor in said bond would be liable, upon the evidence, either for any penalty or damages by reason of the non- performance and breach of the conditions of said bond.
On May 3, 1878, the city of Boston paid into court the sum of $100, 000, and, in addition, the interest accrued to December 1, 1869, and subsequently, on February 25, 1880, an additional amount for interest in full. On March 17, 1880, the following claim of the state of Rhode Island was filed by the allowance of the court as of April 15, 1878, after the entry of the interlocutory decree of that date: [108 U.S. 436, 446] 'And now comes the state of Rhode Island, by the undersigned, the same counsel who have appeared for the defendant Clark, general treasurer of said state, and, without prejudice to the demurrer of said general treasurer, claims the fund in the registry of the court.' This was signed by counsel. On final hearing the fund was awarded to the appellees; and from that decree Clark, general treasurer of the state of Rhode Island, and the state of Rhode Island appealed. The state itself is a party to the appeal bond, which recites that the state of Rhode Island was an intervenor and claimant of the fund in court, and that a decree was rendered against it as such.
'Know all men by these presents that the Boston, Hartford & Erie Railroad Company, a corporation created by the general assembly of the state or Connecticut, is held and firmly bound to the state of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations in the sum of one hundred thousand dollars, to be paid to said state of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations; to which payment, well and truly to be made, the said corporation doth bind itself and its successors firmly by these presents.
'Now, therefore, if said Boston, Hartford & Erie Railroad Company shall complete their said railroad before the first day of January, A. D. 1872, then the aforewritten obligation shall be void; otherwise be and remain in full force and effect.
'In testimony whereof, said Boston, Hartford & Erie Railroad Company have caused this instrument to be signed by John S. Eldredge, its president, and its corporate seal to be thereto affixed, this twenty- third day of June, 1869.
'By JOHN S. ELDREDGE, President.
The testimony taken in the cause pursuant to the interlocutory decree, it is admitted, failed to prove any damage or loss occasioned to the state of Rhode Island, or to any of its citizens or inhabitants, by reason of the failure of the railroad company to comply with the conditions of this bond.
The first question for determination on this appeal is that of jurisdiction, raised first by the demurrer and afterwards by the answer of Clark, general treasurer of the state of Rhode Island, on the ground that the suit was in effect brought against a state by citizens of another state, contrary to the eleventh amendment to the constitution of the United States. We are relieved, however, from its consideration by the voluntary appearance of the state in intervening as a claimant of the fund in court. The immunity from suit belonging to a state, which is respected and protected by the constitution within the limits of the judicial power of the United States, is a personal privilege which it may waive at pleasure; so that in a suit, otherwise well brought, in which a state had sufficient interest to entitle it to become a party defendant, its appearance in a court of the United States would be a voluntary submission to its jurisdiction. while, of course, those courts are always open to it as a suitor in controversies between it and [108 U.S. 436, 448] citizens of other states. In the present case the state of Rhode Island appeared in the cause and presented and prosecuted a claim to the fund in controversy, and thereby made itself a party to the litigation to the full extent required for its complete determination. It became an actor as well as defendant, as by its intervention the proceeding became one in the nature of an interpleader, in which it became necessary to adjudicate the adverse rights of the state and the appellees to the fund, to which both claimed title. The case differs from that of Georgia v. Jesup, 106 U.S. 462 , [1 SUP. CT. REP. 363,] where the state expressly declined to become a party to the suit, and appeared only to protest against the exercise of jurisdiction by the court. The circumstance that the appearance of the state was entered without prejudice to the demurrer of Clark, the general treasurer, does not affect the result. For that demurrer could not reach beyond the question of the right to sue Clark by reason of his official character, which became insignificant when the state made itself a party; and in point of fact the bill was framed to avoid the objection, by charging Clark as a wrong-doer in his individual capacity. For the groundwork of the bill, whether it be regarded as directed against the officer or the state, is that the transaction throughout was void, as ultra vires the corporation. And this presents the next question to be considered. That question arises and is to be determined upon the following statement of facts.
This act of the legislature of Rhode Island was duly accepted by the stockholders of the Boston, Hartford & Erie Railroad Company; the bond required by the twelfth section, as already set out, was executed and delivered; and the certificate of indebtedness, in lieu of sureties, was given by the company and accepted by the state.
It is now argued by counsel for the appellees that the party which, in all these transactions, was dealing with the state of Rhode Island, was the Boston, Hartford & Erie Railroad Company, in its character as a corporation of the state of Connecticut; that, as such, it had no power, under the charter granted by that state, to build or own a railroad directly connecting Boston and Providence, nor had it, as such, any capacity to receive a grant of such a franchise; that, consequently, everything done or attempted in that behalf was ultra vires and void.
But the Boston, Hartford & Erie Railroad Company was also a corporation of Rhode Island. As such, it owned and operated a railroad within that state, and had received and exercised franchises under its laws, to which it was in all respects subject. It was the assignee of the road and rights connected therewith, formerly belonging to the Hartford, Providence & Fishkill Railroad Company; and it was this corporation, dwelling and acting in Rhode Island, that the legislature, by the act in question, authorized to exercise the additional powers it conferred.
If it had had no previous existence as a corporation under the laws of Rhode Island, it would have become such by virtue of the act in question. For although, as a Connecticut corpora- [108 U.S. 436, 452] tion, it may have had no capacity to act or exist in Rhode Island for these purposes, and no capacity by virtue of its Connecticut charter to accept and exercise any franchises not contemplated by it, yet the natural persons, who were corporators, might as well be a corporation in Rhode Island as in Connecticut; and, by accepting charters from both states, could well become a corporate body, by the same name and acting through the same organization, officers, and agencies, in each, with such faculties in the two jurisdictions as they might severally confer. The same association of natural persons would thus be constituted into two distinct corporate entities in the two states, acting in each according to the powers locally bestowed, as distinctly as though they had nothing in common either as to name, capital, or membership. Such was in fact the case in regard to this company, so that in Rhode Island it was exclusively a corporation of that state, subject to its laws and competent to do within its territory whatever its legislation might authorize. 'Nor do we see any reason,' as was said by this court, Mr. Justice SWAYNE delivering its opinion, in Railroad Co. v. Harris, 12 Wall. 65-82, 'why one state may not make a corporation of another state, as there organized and conducted, a corporation of its own, quo ad hoc any property within its territorial jurisdiction. That this may be done was distinctly held in Ohio & M. R. Co. v. Wheeler, 1 Black, 297.' The same view was taken in Railway Co. v. Whitton, 13 Wall. 270; in Railroad Co. v. Vance, 96 U.S. 459 ; and in Memphis & C. R. Co. v. Alabama, ante, 432, decided at the present term. The question of the powers of the Boston, Hartford & Erie Railroad Company, as a corporation in Rhode Island, and of the legal effect of its acts and transactions performed in that state, is to be determined exclusively by the laws of that state, and not by those of Connecticut, which have no force beyond its own territory. It results, therefore, that the doctrine of ultra vires, as here urged by the appellees, has no place in this controversy. [108 U.S. 436, 453] It is, however, urged on behalf of the appellees-and this was the ground on which the decree below proceeded-that the obligation required by the statute and given by the company was a bond, in the penal sum of $100, 000, conditioned that the company would completely build its road within the period limited, upon which no recovery can be had, except for such damages as may be shown to have resulted to the state of Rhode Island from the breach of its condition; that no damage on that account is proven, it being in fact admitted that none actually resulted; that the certificate of indebtedness and the fund which has arisen from its payment were pledged merely, in lieu of sureties, as collateral security for the satisfaction of the bond; and that, consequently, the claim of the stae of Rhode Island against it having thus failed, that fund reverts to the appellees.
While this may be accepted as a sufficiently accurate statement of the general rule, as to bonds with conditions, designed [108 U.S. 436, 454] as an indemnity between private persons for non-performance of a collateral agreement, yet, in respect to such cases, it cannot be considered as universally true. 'It is often a doubtful question,' said the supreme judicial court of Massachusetts in Hodges v. King, 7 Metc. 583- 587, 'whether the sum stipulated to be paid on the non-performance of a condition is in the nature of a penalty, or is the amount settled by the parties for the purpose of making that certain which would be otherwise uncertain. ... The bond has indeed a condition; but that is a matter of form and cannot turn that into a penalty which, but for the form, is an agreement to pay a precise sum under certain circumstances.' So that it cannot correctly be said to be true, in all such cases, that the intention to treat the sum named in the bond as a penalty to secure the performance of the condition, and to be discharged on payment of damages arising from non-performance, can be inferred as a rule of law, or a conclusive presumption, from the mere form of the obligation.
'In short, the general principle now adopted is that, wherever a penalty is inserted merely to secure the performance or enjoyment of a collateral object, the latter is considered as the principal intent of the instrument, and the penalty is deemed only as accessory, and therefore as intended only to secure the due performance thereof or the damage really incurred by the non-performance. In every such case the true test generally, if not universally, by which to ascertain whether relief can or cannot be had in equity, is to consider whether compensation can be made or not. If it cannot be made, then courts of equity will not interfere. If it can be made, then, if the penalty is to secure the mere payment of money, courts of equity will relieve the party upon paying the principal and interest. If it is to secure the performance of some collateral act or undertaking, then courts of equity will retain the bill, and will direct an issue of quantum damnificatus; and when the amount of the damages is ascertained by a jury, upon the trial of such an issue, they will grant relief upon payment of such damages.' Eq. Jur. 1314.
The application of this principle becomes more manifest in cases where a public interest or policy supervenes, as where, for non-compliance by stockholders in corporations engaged in undertakings of a public nature, with the terms of payment of installments due on account of their shares, by which a forfeiture of the stock and of all previous payments thereon has been incurred and declared, the courts refuse to grant relief. Sparks v. Proprietors of Liverpool Water-works, 13 Ves. 428; Prendergast v. Turton, 1 Younge & C. Ch. 98; Naylor v. South Devon Ry. Co. 1 De G. & S. 32; Sudlow v. Dutch Rhenish Ry. Co. 21 Beav. 43.
In Powell v. Redfield, 4 Blatchf. C.C. 45, an application was made in equity to restrain suits upon a bond given in pursuance of the revenue laws of the United States, which was denied on the ground that a court of equity had no right to interfere, and, by injunction or decree, to virtually repeal the express provisions of a positive statute. or defeat their operation in the particular case.
'It certainly is not to be regarded as a bond with a collateral condition, in which the jury are to assess the damages which the United States shall prove that they have sustained; for, according to that construction, the amount of damages would not depend upon the amount of the penalty described in the section, which is graduated according to the size of the vessel, but would depend upon the discretion of different juries, and larger damages might be given where the penalty was only $400, than in a case where the penalty was $ 2,000.
'This, obviously, is not the intention of the law; and the United States are entitled to recover the whole sum, for which the party is bound, if any one of the conditions are broken. Besides, how could the United States prove any particular amount of damages to have been sustained by them in a suit on this bond? What do they lose? It would be difficult, we think, by any course of proof or any process of reasoning, to show that the United States had sustained any particular amount of damages in a case of this description, or to adopt any rule by which the damages could be measured by a jury, or be liquidated by agreement between the parties.
'The sum, for which the parties are to become bound, is, manifestly, a penalty or forfeiture, inflicted by the sovereign power for a breach of its laws.
Recurring now to the particular circumstances of the present case, with a view to the application of these principles and decisions, we are satisfied that the proper solution of the question now under examination is to be found in two principal considerations.
The first of these is that it was not intended by the parties, the state of Rhode Island on the one hand, and the Boston, Hartford & Erie Railroad Company on the other, that the ob- [108 U.S. 436, 460] ligation given and accepted should be for an indemnity against any loss or damage expected to be suffered by the state, in the event that the railroad company should fail to build the railroad as required. It is found as a fact that no such loss or damage has in fact ensued. It is equally plain that none could possibly have arisen. The security is not to be extended to any supposed damage to private interests legally affected by the process of constructing the work. All damage of this kind to private persons was carefully provided for in other parts of the act. As to the state itself, the real party to the arrangement and contract, it could gain nothing in its political and sovereign character by the construction of the road; it could lose nothing by the default. If it could be supposed as possible that the state had in view the public interests of commerce and trade in the construction of the proposed railroad, and meant to provide for loss and damage to them by reason of its failure, the obvious answer is that no computation and assessment of actual damages on that account would be practicable, leaving as the alternative that the state, in fixing the penalty of the bond in the statute, had established its own measure of the public loss. The question of damages and compensation was not, because it could not have been, in contemplation of the parties. There was no room for supposing that there could be any. To assume that the statute required this bond and security in this sense, in full view of the legal conclusion which it is said necessarily flows from its form, and that in the event contemplated, of the failure to build the road, all that remained to be done was that the state should hand back canceled the obligation and security it had been at such pains to exact, is to put upon the transaction an interpretation altogether inadmissible. It would have been, upon such an assumption, a vain and senseless thing, and however private persons may be sometimes supposed to act improvidently, we are not to put such constructions, when it is legally possible to avoid them, upon the deliberate and solemn acts and transactions of a sovereign power, acting through the forms of legislation.
The conclusion, in our opinion, cannot be resisted that the intention of the parties in the transaction in question was that if the railroad should [108 U.S. 436, 461] not be built within the time limited, the corporation should pay to the state, absolutely and for its own use, the sum named in the bond and secured by the deposited certificate of indebtedness. The supposition is not open that the penalty was prescribed merely in terrorem, to secure punctuality in performance, with the reserved intention of permitting subsequent performance to condone the default, for a distinct section of the statute (section 9) declares that in case of failure to complete the road within the time limited, the act itself should be void and of no effect.
In the second place, we think that the sum named in the statute is imposed by it as a statutory penalty for the non-performance of a statutory duty. The obligation required is that the railroad company shall give a bond, with satisfactory security, that they will obey the law; that they will complete their road as required by it. The language evidently means that, in case they fail to do so, they shall forfeit and pay the sum named; and, in order to insure its payment, additional parties to the bond, as sureties, are required. It is admitted that if it does not mean this it does not mean anything, and we have already said that we are not at liberty to adopt that alternative. We must construe it ut res magis valeat quam pereat; and the rule of strictness, in the construction of penal statutes, does not require an interpretation which defeats the very object of the law. The state of Rhode Island was dealing with one of its own corporations, and it had perfect right to act upon its own policy and prescribe its own terms, as conditions of powers and privileges sought from its authority.
For these reasons the decree of the circuit court is reversed, and the cause is remanded, with instructions to enter a decree in favor of the state of Rhode Island for the sum of $100,000, payable out of the fund in court, with so much interest thereon, if any, as has accrued on that sum since the first day of January, 1872, which is the date when the amount became due. And it is accordingly so ordered.

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