Court Opinion

ID: 7195999
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2022-07-24 17:02:42.223936+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T16:16:20.493378
License: Public Domain

Dissenting Opinion.
McEnery, J.
On August 28,1893, the Lafayette Bank of St. Louis filed a suit in the Civil District Court for the parish of Orleans, for the appointment of a receiver to the Algiers Brewing Company.
In the application for the appointment of a receiver j it is averred that the management of the company was characterized by waste, extravagance and recklessness; that the mortgage bonds of the company were sold at the rate of fifty cents on the dollar by said company as the result of a combination and conspiracy between the management of said brewing company and certain persons named in the petition; that a great number of suits were pending against said company; that the entire plant was under seizure in the suit of August Borman vs. said company, to satisfy a debt of $333.33, in pursuance of a judgment rendered in said suit, and the same was authorized to be sold by the sheriff; that certain parts of the machinery of said company were in the hands of the sheriff under writs issued in the suit of First National Bank of Chicago vs. said company; that six mules were also under seizure in another suit against said company ; that certain members of the board of directors, acting in concert with certain stockholders of said corporation and certain bondholders, had conspired and confederated together to obtain possession of the entire plant of said corporation in satisfaction of their bonded indebtedness under consent proceedings to be instituted in the United States Circuit Court; that the board of directors and stockholders of said corporation had passed a resolution and signed a paper agreeing and consenting to an application about to be made on behalf of one of the bondholders, acting for himself and the other bondholders, for the immediate appointment of a receiver to administer the property of said corporation through the interposition of the United States Circuit Court, thus establishing consent to the appointment of a receiver and recognizing the necessicy therefor. The corporation is alleged to be in an insolvent condition.
On this application an ex parte judgment was rendered appointing *106a receiver to be “invested with all the powers with which receivers are invested under the law.” He was directed to take charge of the property of the corporation, and the proceedings in case of Borman vs. said company were ordered stayed and the mules and machinery sequestrated in the other suits were ordered in the possession of the receiver without prejudice to the rights of the seizing creditors under their writs.
Accompanying the petition the plaintiff, who applied for the order, filed some evidence to substantiate the allegations in the petition. But the proceedings were conducted contradictorily with no one, and the judgment appointing the receiver was solely ex parte.
Within ten days after signing the ex parte judgment appointing a receiver, the relator applied for a suspensive appeal from the judgment and tendered a bond. The appeals were refused. Hence the application to this court for the necessary writs to enforce the granting of the appeals.
In the briefs filed there is considerable length devoted to the question whether or not the respondent judge had the power to issue the ex parte order appointing a receiver.
The order may or may not have been properly granted. This question can only be determined when the judgment is before us on appeal. Our inquiry is now restricted to whether the relator is entitled to a suspensive appeal from the ex parte judgment.
The application for the suspensive, appeal is resisted on the following grounds: (1) That the creditors and stockholders were not par ties to the judgment, and as third parties they must produce proof, which must be established contradictorily with the parties to the judgment, that they have an appealable interest; (2) that the judgment is interlocutory and works no irreparable injury; (3) that the remedy to correct such an appointment is by rule to set aside the judgment, improvidently granted, and an appeal from the judgment on the rule.
The other grounds of consent to the appointment of a receiver and the acknowledgment of its necessity properly belong to the investigation of the rightful issuance of the order from which an appeal is asked.
1. On the first point it is evident that in the present proceeding the question raised properly belongs to the proceedings on appeal in a motion to dismiss the appeal. In application to this court in the *107first instance for writs, the interest of the parties is presented on a prima faeie showing. The petition of relator shows an appealable interest, and this petition is accompanied by his affidavit. Even when the appeal is on file in this court it is sufficient if the record shows a pecuniary interest. State ex rel. Bonnet vs. Judge at hoc, 29 An. 397.
In the case of Insurance Co. vs. Costa, 32 An. 3, this court said that this pecuniary interest may be shown by proper affidavit, indicating the nature and extent of the right imperiled by the decree and by the recitals of which the opposite parties would be so minutely informed as to be enabled to conclude, by an inspection of the evidence itself, whether to contest or acknowledge the applicant’s right to an appeal.
2. An interlocutory order is something which is ordered by the court between the commencement and end of a suit which decides some preliminary part or matter, which, however, is not a final decision of the matter in issue. Erom this class of decrees an appeal is permitted when an irreparable injury may result from its enforcement. But in a judgment appointing a receiver certain facts have to be presented and passed upon by the judge-to whom the application is presented, and the decree in such a case possesses some of the elements of a final judgment, which requires the signature of the judge and belongs to that class named in the Code of Practice, distinguishing them from interlocutory orders, which do not require the signature of the judge, but which must be correctly entered in the record. Code Practice, 537, 544, 546; Starke vs. Burke, 9 An. 345.
The facts alleged by respondent in his application for the appointment of receiver, such as the abandonment of the franchises of the corporation, its insolvency, and the conspiracy between the shareholders and directors, are matters which by a definite judgment may become res judicata between the parties to the litigation. Code Practice, 539.
A judgment contradictorily rendered is that which has been given after the parties have been heard, either in support of their claims or their defense. Code Practice, Art. 535.
The usual method of appointing a receiver is after the parties have been heard, and a judgment is rendered on the facts presented. That there is a consent judgment does not detract from the force of the judgnient, as the facts are admitted and proof by witnesses and *108documentary evidence dispensed with. All such judgments have to be signed as final judgments, which may become definitive as to the issues presented by abandoning an appeal, or by a final' judgment of the appellate court.
From all such judgments an appeal will lie, and the reports of this State will show that appeals from judgments appointing receivers have never been denied.
3. It is urged by plaintiff and respondent that the relator should have provoked a rule to set aside the ex parte judgment appointing a receiver, and an appeal should have been taken from the judgment on the rule.
I fail to see the force of this argument. In some cases in the exercise of the supervisiory jurisdiction of the Supreme Court over inferior tribunals, it may be required that the applicant for relief exhaust his remedies in the lower court. In the exercise of the right of appeal if the party east could appeal from a judgment rendered contradictorily with him, there seems to be a stronger reason why he should be permitted to do so if the proceedings leading to the judgment have been ex parte and irregular.
What reason is there for the proposition that the defendant should proceed by rule and ask a reversal of the judgment as a prerequisite to an appeal? The presumption is that the judgment is valid, and why should the defendant require the court to reverse its proceedings as irregular and proceed regularly to pronounce judgment before an appeal should be allowed? The time of the court should not be occupied in order to reach such a result when it can be accomplished by a direct proceeding by appealing at once from the judgment. It avoids expense and delay, and the convenient and speedy administration of justice is the first consideration of courts in the disposal of cases. But it is from the judgment rendered from which the defendant has the right to appeal, no matter how rendered, so that it is final, or an interlocutory order that may work an irreparable injury. The jndgment may be null and void from irregularities in the proceedings. The defendant has the right to attack it and have its nullity declared, either by appeal or an action of nullity. The relator herein has chosen the first mode of proceeding — by an appeal, a constitutional right which can not be denied him. State ex rel. Johnson vs. Judge, 36 An. 210; State ex rel. Morey vs. Judge, 31 An. 823-836.
4. It is suggested in respondent’s brief that the action of the court in the appointment of a receiver is not reversable on appeal.
*109This doctrine has been unquestionably held in other jurisdictions) but in this State there is no statutory proceeding authorizing the appointment of a receiver to a corporation, and the assumption of such authority by the courts has only been in extreme and special cases, such as where the property of the corporation has been abandoned or where there are no persons authorized to take charge of orto conduct its affairs. Baker vs. Railroad Co., 34 An. 754; State ex rel. Brittin vs. City, 43 An. 830.
And this authority has heretofore been exercised when all the parties were before the court.
Whether there was a consent proceeding in the lower court to authorize the ex parte judgment appointing the receiver can only be determined when all the facts, are before us on appeal.
The respondents contend that in no event is the relator entitled to a suspensive appeal, and Art. 580 of the Code of Practice is referred to as being conclusive on this point.
The judgments which are executed provisionally are mentioned in said article and rendered in the matter of the appointment of tutors and curators of incapacitated persons, and syndics of creditors where they are ordered to administer provisionally as creditors of Vacant successions. The reasons for these exceptions are obvious. The necessity for some one to take care of the incapacitated persons or vacant estate is imperative, and the syndic provisionally appointed remains in charge, of the provisional administration only, without power to sell, his acts only being conservatory until a regular syndic is elected by the creditors. In this case there was no provisional appointment of a reeeiverjwith power limited to conservatory acts, but he has the amplest power under the order for a full administration, extending to the sale of the effects under the order of court and a general winding up of the concerns of the corporation. .
The article referred to does not include a judgment relating to such matters.
If a party has a right to appeal, the rule is that he can appeal suspensively, and I find no exception to the judgment in appointing a receiver to a corporation jwith full powers of administration. The directors had no power to[eonsent to the appointment of a receiver. The shareholders only couldigive this consent. The directors are only the agents of the shareholders and can not do any act not authorized by the charter.
Rehearing refused.