Court Opinion

ID: 9418335
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 22:21:50.395144+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:22:00.721158
License: Public Domain

*429Mr. Justice Van Devanter,
dissenting.
I dissent from tfie conclusion that this proceeding could be brought and maintained in the state court. It is an information in the nature of a quo warranto against a federal corporation, a national bank. It calls in question the bank’s right to exercise a privilege claimed under an act of Congress, the privilege, under the terms of the act, being conferred only when “not in contravention of State or local law.” The information was brought by the Attorney General of the State in his own name, and charges that the bank’s exercise of the privilege is “in contempt of the people of the State,” by which it is meant, as the record discloses, first, that the exercise of the privilege by the bank is in contravention of the law of the State, and, second, that the act of Congress under which the privilege is claimed transcends the power of Congress and is void. The state court dealt with both grounds. The first was overruled and the second sustained. The judgment rendered enjoins and excludes the bank from exercising the privilege.
The writ of quo warranto was a prerogative writ and the modern proceeding by information is not different in that respect. When it is brought to exclude the exercise of a franchise, privilege or power claimed under the United States it can only be brought in the name of the United States and by its representative, or in such other mode as it may have sanctioned. Wallace v. Anderson, 5 Wheat. 291; Territory v. Lockwood, 3 Wall. 236; Newman v. Frizzell, 238 U. S. 537. As is said in the Lockwood Case, “the right to institute such proceedings is inherently in the Government of the nation.” This is particularly true of national banks, for they not only derive all their powers from the United States, but are instrumentalities created by it for a public purpose, and “are not to be interfered with by state legislative or judicial action, except so far *430as the law making power of the Government may permit.” Davis v. Elmira Savings Bank, 161 U. S. 275, 283; Van Reed v. People’s National Bank, 198 U. S. 554, 557. Indeed, they are upon much the same plane as are officers of the United States, because their conduct can only be controlled by the power that created them. McClung v. Silliman, 6 Wheat. 598, 605. If it were otherwise the supremacy of the United States and of its Constitution and laws would be seriously imperiled. Ableman v. Booth, 21 How. 506; Tarble’s Case, 13 Wall. 397; Tennessee v. Davis, 100 U. S. 257; State ex rel. Wilcox v. Curtis, 35 Conn. 374.
Thus much, as I understand it, is conceded in this court’s opinion, the conclusion that the state court could entertain the information and proceed to judgment thereon, as was done, being rested upon an implied authorization by Congress. This authorization is thought to be found in the provision stating that the privilege claimed is given only “when not in contravention of State or local law” and in the provision in the Act of Juñe 3, 1864, c. 106, § 57, 13 Stat. 116, now in Rev. Stats., § 5198,.which makes suits against national banks cognizable in certain state courts. I do not find any such authorization in either provision.
The first does no more than to withhold the privilege in question from national banks located in States whose laws are opposed to or not in harmony with the possession and exercise of such a privilege on the part of the banks. It says nothing about judicial proceedings — nothing about who shall bring them or where they shall be brought. There is in it no suggestion that quo warranto proceedings were in the mind of Congress. Had there been a purpose to do anything so unusual as to authorize a state officer to institute and conduct such a proceeding in a state court against a federal corporation, is it not reasonable to believe that Congress would have given expression to that pur*431pose? As before indicated, it said nothing upon the point, — just as it would have done had no such purpose been in mind. But if the words “when not in contravention of State or local law” could be regarded as giving any warrant for a quo warranto proceeding by a state officer in a state court, I should say they would do no more than to permit such a proceeding to determine whether the privilege was in contravention of the state law. There is nothing in them which points even remotely to a purpose to sanction a proceeding to determine the power of Congress under the Constitution to clothe a national bank with the privilege indicated. That would be without any precedent in the legislation relating to federal corporations, and I submit that it is most improbable that Congress either did or would entertain such a purpose.
The provision cited from the Act of 1864 has been in the statutes for fifty-three years and no one seems ever to havé thought until now that it was intended to authorize a proceeding such as this against a national bank. I think its words do not fairly lend themselves to that purpose.' They have hitherto been regarded, and in practice treated, as referring to ordinary suits such as may be conveniently prosecuted against a bank in its home town and county. Besides, the terms of the provision show that it can have no applicatión here. After providing for suing a national bank in the federal-or territorial court of the district in which it is established, the provision adds, “or in any state, county, or municipal court in the county or city in which said association is located.” This bank, as the record discloses, is located in Bay City, Bay County. The proceeding was begun and had in the Supreme Court of the State at the capital, which is Lansing, Ingham County. Therefore the provision can give no support to the proceeding.
For these reasons I think the judgment should be re*432versed with a direction to dismiss the information for want of jurisdiction.
Mr. Justice Day authorizes me to say that he. concurs in this dissent.