Court Opinion

ID: 9444193
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-03 19:45:07.938356+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:29:45.690082
License: Public Domain

FRANK, Circuit Judge
(dissenting).
On the former appeal, 2 Cir., 207 F.2d 67, we held that the district judge had erred in failing to find that the Bank owed substantially the amount previously determined by the Special Master, whose conclusions the judge had over-ruled in large part. In other words, we held that, had the judge not erred, his judgment, entered on December 19, 1952, would have been not merely for §262,-760.17 but for about a million dollars greater.
The judge, in arriving at his much smaller judgment of $262,760.17, had included interest at 3% up to the date of judgment (i. e., December 19, 1952). We said, 207 F.2d at page 77, that, as the Bank had been but negligent and not guilty of bad faith, we would not disturb the exaction of only 3% (instead of 6% as urged by the plaintiffs) to the date of judgment, since, in the circumstances, that was a matter within the judge’s discretion. But I do not at all agree1 with my colleagues that, in our ruling, “the implication is clear” that 3% only was to be the rate on the large amount by which we increased the sum due, from December 19, 1952 to the subsequent entry of the revised judgment pursuant to our mandate. True, we said nothing on that subject, for the very simple reason that we did not think about it. If we had, I have not the slightest doubt that we would then have said that, as the judge ought to have given judgment on December 19, 1952 for the much larger amount, interest on that figure should be at 6% from that date. For it is most unjust that, merely because the trial judge erred in over-ruling the Special Master, the plaintiffs, successors of bondholders who lost heavily on account of the Bank’s negligence, should be deprived of the full 6% rate on more than $1,-500,000 for some ten months — from December 19, 1952 until October 23, 1953, when the new judgment on the mandate issued. (The plaintiffs did not, on the previous appeal, ask us to direct a judgment nunc pro tunc, doubtless because, in one of this series of cases, a suit by these plaintiffs against another bank, The Bank of Manhattan, where we reversed and remanded without such a direction, the same trial judge had entered judgment nunc pro tunc, with interest at 6%, and that bank had not appealed.)
I agree that, in the light of Briggs v. Pennsylvania R. Co., 2 Cir., 164 F.2d 21, 23, affirmed 334 U.S. 304, 68 S.Ct. 1039, 1040, 92 L.Ed. 1403, our mandate did not authorize the judge to enter judgment on the mandate as he did. But in the Briggs case, both this court and the Supreme Court (1) stressed the fact that our term had expired when the second *446appeal was taken, and (2) expressly refrained from deciding whether, even so, our mandate should have been amended if on the second appeal the plaintiff had requested the Court to amend it.2 The Supreme Court, in the Briggs case, said: “It is clear that the interest was in excess of the terms of the mandate and hence was wrongly included in the District Court’s judgment and rightly stricken out by the Circuit Court of Appeals. The latter court’s mandate made no provision for such interest and the trial court had no power to enter judgment for an amount different than directed. If any enlargement of that amount were possible, it could be done only by amendment of the mandate. But no move to do this was made during the term at which it went down. While power to act on its mandate after the term expires survives to protect the integrity of the court’s own processes, Hazel-Atlas Glass Co. v. Hartford Co., 322 U.S. 238, 64 S.Ct. 997, 88 L.Ed. 1250, it has not been held to survive for the convenience of litigants. Fairmont Creamery Co. v. Minnesota, 275 U.S. 70, 48 S.Ct. 97, 72 L.Ed. 168. The plaintiff has at no time moved to amend the mandate which is the basis of the judgment. That it-made no provision for interest was apparent on its face. Plaintiff accepted its advantages and brings her case to this Court, not on the proposition that améndment of the mandate has been improperly refused, but on the ground that the mandate should be disregarded. Such a position cannot be sustained. Hence the question whether interest might, on proper application, have been allowed, is not reached.”3
Since our decision in the Briggs case (1947), Congress has abolished court terms and we are now entirely free to change our mandate to achieve justice. See 28 U.S.C. § 452, and National Comics Publication v. Fawcett Publications, 2 Cir., 198 F.2d 927. Moreover, here the plaintiffs specially request us to amend our mandate. My colleagues’ decision refusing to do so is, I think, in direct conflict with Givens v. Missouri-Kansas-Texas R. Co. of Texas, 5 Cir., 196 F.2d 905. I hope, therefore, that the Supreme Court will grant certiorari here.

. I happened to he one of the panel of this court which heard and decided the earlier appeal.

. See Givens v. Missouri-Kansas-Texas R. Co. of Texas, 5 Cir., 196 F.2d 905, 906.

. Emphasis added.