Case Name: Wheeless & Pratt vs. F. M. Fisk
Court: Louisiana Supreme Court
Jurisdiction: Louisiana
Decision Date: 1876-05
Citations: 28 La. Ann. 731
Docket Number: No. 3291
Parties: Wheeless & Pratt vs. F. M. Fisk.
Judges: 
Reporter: Louisiana Annual Reports
Volume: 28
Pages: 731–733

Head Matter:
No. 3291.
Wheeless & Pratt vs. F. M. Fisk.
The discharge granted by the bankrupt court to the defendant will protect him from further responsibility to plaintiffs, but it can not avail to dismiss the appeal. The plaintiffs have the right to make the surety on the suspensive appeal bond liable, in case it should be determined that the judgment appealed from is correct.
where a State court has obtained lawful jurisdiction of the parties and the subject - matter, that jurisdiction continues as long as the amount duo is in dispute or remains unascertained.
The trial by jury in the ease was properly refused, it being the settled practice of the court below to refuse application for a jury after the ease has been once fixed and continued by preference. The ease having been set' down for trial, the application for a jury was too late.
The defense based upon the allegation that the contract sued upon was of an aleatory character and therefore immoral is not well founded. The faetthat defendant only furnished a part of the price necessary to buy the gold ordered to be bought, or, as it is technically called, a margin, did not make the contract immoral. Like all other commercial ventures, it might result advantageously or not, according to the circumstances, but that did not make it unlawful.
APPEAL from the Fourth District Court, parish of Orleans. Théard, J.
Breaux, Fenner A* Hall, for plaintiffs and appellees.
M. M. Cohen and W. B. Lancaster, for defendant and appellant.
Semmes & Mott, for defendant’s assignee in bankruptcy.

Opinion:
Os Motion to Dismiss.
Wi'lt. J.
On the first of February, 1871, the defendant took a sus-pensive appeal from the judgment against him for §977 46. He was subsequently adjudged a bankrupt, and at the trial in this court offered his discharge in bar o£ the action against Mm, and prayed that the appeal herein be dismissed.
The discharge granted by the bankrupt court to the defendant will protect him from further responsibility to the plaintiffs, but it can not avail to dismiss the appeal. The plaintiffs have the right to make the surety on the suspensive appeal bond liable in case it should be determined that the judgment appealed from is correct. This court has authority to revise that judgment and settle the controversy, because, as we have just decided in the case of Switzer vs. Heinn, where a State court has obtained lawful jurisdiction of the parties and the subject matter, that jurisdiction continues as "long as the amount due is in dispute or remains unascertained." Bump on Bankruptcy, sixth edition, pages 187,198,199, and authorities there cited. The assignee, however, has not been cited.
It is therefore ordered that this case be continued, in order to make the assignee of the bankrupt, E. M. Fisk, a party .to this appeal.