Case Name: FRIEDLAND v. UNION SURETY & GUARANTY CO.
Court: New York Supreme Court, Appellate Term
Jurisdiction: New York
Decision Date: 1904-02-23
Citations: 86 N.Y.S. 937
Docket Number: 
Parties: FRIEDLAND v. UNION SURETY & GUARANTY CO.
Judges: 
Reporter: West's New York Supplement
Volume: 86
Pages: 937–941

Head Matter:
FRIEDLAND v. UNION SURETY & GUARANTY CO.
(Supreme Court, Appellate Term.
February 23, 1904.)
1. Municipal Court—Jurisdiction—Foreign Corporation.
Under the Municipal Court act (Laws 1902, pp. 1488, 1489, c. 580, § 1), specifying as the subject of jurisdiction of that court the bond of a marshal of the city of New York as prescribed in the act (subdivision 5), and as persons subject to its jurisdiction foreign corporations having an office in the city of New York, where the amount claimed does not exceed $500 (subdivision 18), it has no jurisdiction of an action against such foreign corporation as surety on the bond of a marshal of the city of Hew York, where the amount involved is over $500, though there is no limit as to amount specified in subdivision 5.
Appeal from Municipal Court, Borough of Manhattan, Ninth District.
Action by Abraham Friedland against the Union Surety and Guaranty Company. From a judgment for defendant, plaintiff appeals. Affirmed.
Argued before FREEDMAN, P. J., and GILDERSLEEVE and GREENBAUM, JJ.
S. Sutton, for appellant.
Van Schaick & Norton, for respondent.

Opinion:
GILDERSLEEVE, J.
The sole question raised by this appeal, is, whether the Municipal Court has jurisdiction to render • judgment against a foreign corporation having an office in the city of New York,, and being the surety in a bond given by one of the marshals of the city of New York for a greater sum than $500. The Municipal Court held in this case that it had not, and, as the plaintiff claimed to recover upwards of $600, dismissed the complaint on that ground alone; hence this appeal.
The plaintiff's assignors recovered judgment against one Gunn, a marshal appointed for the borough of Brooklyn, and having, pursuant to sections 295 and 296 of the Municipal Court Act (Laws 1902, pp. 1574, 1575, c. 580), applied to a justice of the' Supreme Court in the Second Department for leave to prosecute the marshal's bond in their own names, leave was granted, and it was ordered to be prosecuted in the Municipal Court of the city of New York, and this action was then brought by the plaintiff, as assignee of the judgment creditors. The order granting leave to prosecute the bond in question, as originally made, designated the County Court of Kings county as the court in which the action might be brought. But on the application of the attorney for the moving parties, plaintiff's assignors, it was resettled and modified by substituting the Municipal Court of the city of New York in place of the County Court of Kings county.
The determination of the question thus presented seems to rest on the construction of subdivisions 5 and 18 of section 1 (pages 1488, 1489) and of section 296 (page 1575) of the act. Subdivision 5 specifies, as a subject of jurisdiction of the Municipal Court, "the bond of a marshal of the city of New York as prescribed in this act," and subdivision 18 specifies as persons subject to its jurisdiction ("persons" being defined in section 360 [p. 1593] as including both corporations and natural persons); among others, a foreign corporation having an office in the, city of New York,, where the amount claimed does not exceed $500. Section 295 of the act prescribes the conditions and procedure for obtaining leave to prosecute a marshal's bond by a person aggrieved by the marshal's official misconduct, and section 296 declares that the justice of the Supreme Court to whom the application for leave is made may order the bond to be prosecuted in the Municipal' Court of the city of New York, or in the City Court of the city of New York if the borough for which the marshal was appointed be within the county of New, York, or in the County Court of the county wherein such borough is.situated if in any other county. That section further provides that "either of said courts shall have jurisdiction in actions brought on such bond upon such leave being granted." Thus, by the terms of this section, as construed by us in Fohs v. Rain, 39 Misc. Rep. 319, 79 N. Y. Supp. 872, the justice could have ordered the bond prosecuted in the Municipal Court or in the County Court of Kings county. As already noted, the parties first chose the County Court and afterwards the Municipal Court. In support of his position that, the jurisdiction of the Municipal Court in this case was not limited to $500 the counsel for the appellant argues that subdivision 5 of the act confers jurisdiction in an action on the bond of a marshal without limit to the amount, of damages it may award, and that subdivision 18, although seemingly limited to actions where the amount claimed does not exceed $500, is to be construed as applying that limit exclusively to actions against an administrator or an executor as such; and that it was intended as an increase of the amount to which the District Courts had by the act of 1895 been limited in suits against an executor or an administrator.
The obvious sources of the jurisdiction of the Municipal Court in a case like this are subdivisions 5 and 18, above cited. The former designates the subject-matter of the cognizance; the latter the persons over which it may exercise jurisdiction. One of those persons is a foreign corporation having an office in the city of New York, to which description the defendant here answers. There is no limit in amount specified in subdivision 5, but subdivision 18 contains the limitation of $500. These two subdivisions must be read together, and, so read, by the simplest rules of syntax, the limitation of $500 in subdivision 18 applies to each and every of the persons therein designated. The intention of the Legislature to this effect could hardly.be more plainly expressed. It follows from this view that the court below was right' in holding that it had no jurisdiction to entertain this action, unless section 296 conferred jurisdiction on that court. Recurring to the terms of that section, it will be observed that the Legislature attempted to clothe a justice of the Supreme Coúrt sitting at Special Term with the power and authority to confer upon the Municipal Court, the City Court of the city of New York, and the County Court jurisdiction of actions on marshal's bonds without limit as to amount; and in one case—that of the. County Court—in the face of the express prohibition of the Constitution and the statute against the County Court taking' jtirisdiction in actions -in which the amount claimed exceeds $2,000; O'r the defendant is not a resident of the county. The County Court was established by the Constitution, and its jurisdiction expressly defined and declared in that instrument. The jurisdiction granted to that court excludes a cause in which a nonresident of the county is the defendant, or in which the amount claimed exceeds $2,000. And to guard against legislative interference with these two conditions and limitations of its jurisdiction, the Constitution provides that the Legislature may enlarge or restrict the jurisdiction of the County Court, provided it does not extend it so as to authorize an action therein for the recovery of money only in which the damages demanded exceed $2,000, or in which a person not a resident of the county is the defendant. Const, art. 6, § 14. Now, section 296 of the Municipal Court act is an attempt to give a justice of the Supreme Court at Special Term the power to say that in this case the plaintiff may recover $600, when the act says he cannot recover more than $500, and that the plaintiff, if he had so chosen—as he first did—might have had leave to sue the defendant, a foreign corporation not having an office in Kings county, for an unlimited amount in the County Court of- that county, when the Constitution has declared that the Legislature shall not touch those two features of that court's jurisdiction. The Legislature could not delegate a power which it did not possess; nor, indeed, if it had the power, was it within its prerogative to delegate to one man, not even to a justice of the Supreme Court, authority which might be unwisely used,'to the unintentional, though fatal, confusion of an important part of our judicial system and the inconvenience of the people. The attempt to do so is condemned by every principle of constitutional law and by every consideration of a wise expediency. Cooley on Constitutional Limitations (7th Ed.) c. 5, p. 163; Black's Constitutional Law, §, 142 et seq. For these reasons we hold that the jurisdiction of the Municipal Court in this case rests upon subdivisions 5 and 18 of section 1 of the act, and that they limit the recovery against the defendant here to $500.
The judgment is affirmed, with costs.
FREEDMAN, P. J" concurs.