Court Opinion

ID: 9418529
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 22:29:33.678334+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T16:47:27.382622
License: Public Domain

Mr. Justice Holmes
delivered the opinion of the Court.
The relator, the Bumes National Bank of St. Joseph, was appointed executor by a citizen of Missouri who died on November 27, 1922, leaving a will. The Bank applied to the proper Probate Court for letters testamentary, but was denied appointment on the ground that by the laws of Missouri national banks were not authorized to act as executors. Thereupon it applied to the Supreme Court of the State for a writ of mandamus to the Judge of the Probate Court and an alternative writ was issued. The respondent demurred, the demurrer was sustained and the *23peremptory writ was denied. 302 Mo. 130. A writ of error was allowed by the Chief Justice of the State Court. The Bank claims the capacity to fill the office under the statutes of the United States.
By the Act of September 26, 1918, c. 177, § 2, 40 Stat. 967, 968, amending § ll(k) of the Federal Reserve Act, the Federal Reserve Board was empowered “ To grant by special permit to national banks applying therefor, when not in contravention of State or local law, the right to act as trustee, executor, administrator ... or in any other fiduciary capacity in which State banks, trust companies, or other corporations which come into competition with national banks are permitted to act under the laws of the State in which the national bank is located.” If the section stopped there the decision of the State Court might be final, but it adds the following paragraph, “Whenever the laws of such State authorize or permit the exercise of any or all of the foregoing powers by State banks, trust companies, or other corporations which compete with national banks, the granting to and the exercise of such powers by national banks shall not be deemed to be in contravention of State or local law within the meaning of this Act.” This says in a roundabout and polite but unmistakable way that whatever may be the state law, national banks having the permit of the Federal Reserve Board may act as executors if trust companies competing with them have that power. The relator has the permit, competing trust companies can act as executors in Missouri, the importance of the power to the sustaining of competition in the banking business is so well known and has been explained so fully heretofore that it does not need to be emphasized, and thus the naked question presented is whether Congress had the power to do what it tried to do.
The question is pretty nearly answered by the decision and fully answered by the reasoning in First National *24Bank of Bay City v. Fellows, 244 U. S. 416. That case was decided before the amendment to the Federal Reserve Act that we have quoted and came here on the single issue of the power of Congress when the state law was not contravened. It was held that the power “ was to be tested by the right to create the bank and the' authority to attach to it that which was relevant in the judgment of Congress to make the business of the bank successful.” 244 U. S. 420. The power was asserted and it was added that “ this excluded the power of the State in such case, although it might possess in a general sense authority to regulate such business, to use that authority to prohibit such business from being united by Congress with the banking function.” 244 U. S. 425. Now that Congress has expressed its paramount will this language is more apposite than ever. The States cannot use their most characteristic powers to reach unconstitutional results. Western Union Telegraph Co. v. Kansas, 216 U. S. 1. Pullman Co. v. Kansas, 216 U. S. 56. Western Union Telegraph Co. v. Foster, 247 U. S. 105, 114. There is nothing over which a State has more exclusive authority than the jurisdiction of its courts, but it cannot escape its constitutional obligations by the device of denying jurisdiction to courts otherwise competent. Kenney v. Supreme Lodge of the World, 252 U. S. 411, 415. So here — the State cannot lay hold of its general control of administration to deprive national banks of their power to compete that Congress is authorized to sustain.
The fact that Missouri has regulations to secure the safety of trust funds in the hands of its trust companies does not affect the case. The power given by the act of Congress purports to be general and independent of that circumstance and the act provides its own safeguards. The authority of Congress is equally independent, as otherwise the State could make it nugatory. Since the decision in First National Bank of Bay City v. Fellows, *25244 U. S. 416, it generally has been recognized that the law now is as the relator contends. Turner’s Estate, 277 Pa. St. 110, 116. Estate of Stanchfield, 171 Wis. 553. Hamilton v. State, 94 Conn. 648. People v. Russel, 283 Ill. 520, 524. In re Mollineaux, 179 N. Y. S. 90. Fidelity National Bank & Trust Co. v. Enright, 264 Fed. 236.

Judgment reversed.