Jeter v. Langhorne
Jeter v. Langhorne
Opinion of the Court
Our law giving damages on the dissolution of injunctions has been uniformly the same, from the first enactment on the subject down to the present time.
The act of the 20th of January 1804, provides that “ Where any injunction shall be hereafter obtained, to stay the proceedings on any judgment rendered in any of the Courts of this Commonwealth, for money or to
This enactment we find repeated verbatim in the revisal of 1819; 1 Rev. Code, p. 209, § 61; and in the act of April 1831, establishing the Circuit Superior Courts, Sup. Rev. Code, p. 152, <§> 43, it was so re-enacted, with an alteration merely as to the style of the Court.
The purpose of this law is to give damages at 10 per cent, during the time that the plaintiff at law is restrained from enforcing his judgment by process of ex
This, it seems to me, is the plain meaning of the statute ; and no obscurity can be thrown over the question but by confounding the order for dissolving the injunction with its actual dissolution. A dissolution order may be suspended or set aside by the same Court which made it, and afterwards renewed in the further progress of the cause, or at the final hearing; but surely, during its suspension, or while set aside, there is no dissolution, and in the nature of things cannot be, for the injunction is in full force, and the plaintiff at law restrained from taking out his execution. And so, an appeal from a dissolution order suspends its effect and continues the injunction until the hearing in the Appellate Court; and a reversal in that Court, on the one hand, then confirms the injunction, and an affirmance, on the other, then dissolves the injunction.
It is true that the affirmance by an Appellate Court of any decree or judgment, gives it effect from the lime it was rendered ; but it is moreover true that the affirmance gives effect also to the decree or judgment during
If this were not so, then the enactment of the statute would fall far short of the principle upon which it is founded, to wit, compensation to the plaintiff at law, who has recovered a judgment, and is notwithstanding delayed and harassed in the collection of his money by a vexatious bill of injunction : and the evil is aggravated by the protraction of the litigation in an Appellate Court, whereby the original restraining order is in effect continued, revived or reinstated. The construction of the law contended for by the defendant in error does not comport with either its letter or its spirit; and if sanctioned would make the damages awarded depend, in a great measure, not upqn the ultimate decision of the controversy, but upon the fact whether it was correctly or erroneously decided by the Court of original jurisdiction. For if that Court should correctly decide to dissolve the' injunction, then according to that construction the affirmance in the Appellate Court would entitle the plaintiff at law only to damages until the date of the original dissolution order or decree; whereas if the Court below should erroneously continue or perpetuate
The case of Wood v. Dwight, 7 John. Ch. R. 295, cited for the appellee, was simply this: An injunction had been granted to stay execution at law, which was afterwards dissolved, and the plaintiff in equity filed an arbitrary appeal from the order of dissolution ; and the question was whether the plaintiff at law was at liberty to proceed with his execution, notwithstanding the appeal. The Chancellor, after intimating that an appeal would not lie from such an interlocutory order, which however he did not decide, (that being the province of the Court of Errors,) held that the appeal did not affect the validity of the dissolution order, nor revive the injunction and give it force and effect; that an appeal only stays future proceedings in Court, but the dissolution order was perfect and finished eo instanti that it was entered, and discharged the injunction, which was rendered functus officio, and will not be revived by the mere act of the party. He therefore determined that the appeal did not prevent the plaintiff at law from proceeding to enforce his judgment by execution.
This New York decision has no application to our jurisprudence, it being directly in the teeth of our own statute law, practice and adjudications. For error of a Circuit Court in dissolving an injunction, the Court of Appeals, or any Judge thereof, may, by our injunction law, allow an appeal from the order of dissolution; 1 Rev. Code, p. 205, § 44; Supp. Rev. Code, p. 152,
And it is because the actual dissolution is derived from the dissolution order of the Chancery Court, that the damages for delaying the execution, as well during the pendency of the injunction in the Appellate Court, as during its pendency in the Chancery Court, depend upon the law of injunctions, and not upon the law of appeals. The law of appellate damages has no application to such a case. It applies only where the appeal is from a decree or judgment by which a direct recovery is had, as where a decree or judgment awards the payment of money, and an appeal is taken therefrom. But it is not applicable where the appeal is from a decree or order collateral to the recovery, as where the decree or order dissolves an injunction to a judgment at law. The condition of the appeal bond, it is true, is the same in both cases, to wit, to pay the amount recovered in the Court below, and all costs and damages in the Court
If therefore the plaintiff at law is not entitled to injunction damages while the injunction is pending in the Court of Appeals, but only until the ineffectual order of dissolution in the Chancery Court, then he is without redress ; though there can be no reason for allowing damages for delay of execution occasioned by an appeal from a decree that gives a recovery, and withholding them where such delay is occasioned by an appeal from a decree that removes a restraint improperly imposed upon a pre-existing recovery. Indeed the want of redress under the law of appeals is a sufficient reason for believing that the spirit of the law of injunctions corresponds with its letter, in looking to an effectual instead of a nominal dissolution of the injunction.
I do not perceive that the case cited for the defendant in error, of Woodson v. Johns, 3 Munf. 230, throws any light upon this question. That was an action after dissolution of an injunction, and affirmance of the decree of dissolution upon the injunction bond dated in 1791, and conditioned, the reporter says, for the prosecution of an injunction in the High Court of Chancery, to stay proceedings on a judgment at law ; but the terms of the condition are not stated. At that time, though the law required injunction bonds to be given, 12 Hen. St. p. 467, there was no statute prescribing what should be the condition, nor giving damages upon the dissolution of the injunction. The condition was
The act of the 27th of February 1828, Supp. Rev. Code, p. 126, § 3, made no change in the law of injunction damages; but provides, as the condition of reviving a dissolved injunction by appeal, additional security to the creditor, and indemnity to the surety in the original injunction bond, by requiring a new bond, combining the nature both of an injunction and of an appeal bond. The mischief to be remedied was that by the protraction of the injunction, occasioned by the appeal from the dissolution order, the creditor was subjected to the danger of loss from a supervening insolvency of the debtor, and of the surety in the original injunction bond; and that the surety himself from the same cause was subjected to the like danger from such insolvency of his principal.
The statute accordingly enacts, in the first place, “ that no appeal from any order dissolving an injunction shall have the effect of reviving the same, until the plaintiff shall have entered into bond with security in a penalty equal to the penalty of the injunction bond ; with condition to prosecute the appeal with effect, or to
In the next place the statute enacts that “ in all such cases, the security in the appeal bond shall be answerable over to the security in the injunction bond, for the amount due at the time of the appeal, in case he shall have paid and satisfied the same; for which purpose a suit may be instituted on the appeal bond, by the security in the injunction bond, at his own costs and charges, to recover the amount so paid.” Now, it can hardly be supposed that the legislature intended the indemnity to the surety in the original bond to fall short of his responsibility thereby incurred; but the draftsman of this clause seems, in consulting brevity, to have fallen into some obscurity, by using the comprehensive words, “for the amount due at the time of the appeal,” instead of repeating the particulars in the first clause, to wit, “all such debt, interest, damages arid costs for which the security in the injunction bond was bound.” It could not have been the design to exclude both running interest and damages beyond the dissolution order, which would be the effect of a strict adherence to the letter; while the general words, “amount due at the time of the appeal,” taken with the context and the spirit of the enactment, import the amount due and to become due.
At most, this act of 1828 can furnish, upon this question of damages, nothing more than a legislative impression of the pre-existing law, (which if wrong could be of no avail,) and it would be most strange if, while the legislature were providing for the consequences of a revival of the injunction by an appeal from the dissolution
By the first proviso of the 32d section of that act, Supp. Rev. Code, p. 149, it is enacted, “ that henceforth upon the afiirmance of any decree or judgment whatsoever of any Inferior Court by any Appellate Court, no damages shall be awarded to the party prevailing beyond legal interest on the debt or damages, or profits of property adjudged, and the costs.” What has been already said will serve to shew that this proviso applies only to appeals from decrees or judgments by which a direct recovery of money is had, and not to an appeal from a decree or order dissolving an injunction recovered. And by the 43d section of the same act, the act of January 1804, above quoted, giving 10 per cent, damages, from the awarding an injunction to the dissolution thereof, is re-enacted toiidem verbis. Supp. Rev. Code, p. 152. If there were any thing, therefore, in the act of 1828, whether of enactment or interpretation, inconsistent with these provisions, it would be thereby repealed.
A further distinction between appellate and injunction damages is to be found in the mode of their recovery. The former are awarded in the Appellate Court by the judgment or decree of affirmance : the latter by the law
The damages, whether injunction or appellate, allowed by law for retarding execution, are in the nature of interest, and the substantial effect of both prior to the act of 1831, was to give four per cent, above legal interest upon a judgment carrying running interest, and to give legal interest and four per cent, more upon a judgment carrying no running interest. That act, by its 32d section above quoted, abolishes appellate damages beyond legal interest, but by its 61st section continues injunction damages at 10 per cent. But the effect of the
It is highly probable that the abolition of arbitrary appeals, in most cases, by the act of 1831, led to the reduction of appellate damages made by that act. But it could not have suggested any reduction of injunction damages, for arbitrary appeals from interlocutory orders or decrees dissolving injunctions have never been allowed by law. 2 Rob. Pract. 421, 2. Cases of hardship are, moreover, provided for by the injunction law, which gives to the Equity Court a discretionary power to remit the whole, or any part of the damages, where the injunction was filed to obtain a discovery, or any part of the judgment remains enjoined.
My opinion is, that the Circuit Court erred in sustaining the motion of the defendant in error to quash the execution, for embracing damages at 10 per cent, beyond the order of dissolution, until its affirmance in the Court of Appeals.
Allen, J. The 61st section of the act 1 Rev. Code, p. 209, re-enacted by the 43d section of the act in the Supp. Rev. Code, p. 152, provides, that when an injunction to stay proceedings on any judgment, shall be dissolved wholly or in part, damages at the rate of ten per centum per annum from the time the injunction was awarded, until the dissolution, shall be paid; and the clerk of the Court where the injunction was depending, is directed to certify to the clerk of the Court where the judgment was obtained, the order of dissolution, as also the time of granting and dissolving such injunction ; and the clerk shall issue the execution according to the provisions of the act.
By the 59th section of the act 1 Rev. Code, p. 208, it is provided, that the Court of Appeals, in all cases where
The act of 1831, Supp. Rev. Code, p. 149, <§> 32, modifies the provision in relation to damages upon appeals, by directing that no damages shall be awarded to the party prevailing beyond legal interest.
By another act passed February 27th, 1828, Supp. Rev. Code, p. 126, it is enacted, that no appeal from an order dissolving an injunction, shall revive the same, until the plaintiff shall have entered into bond with security, in a penalty equal to the penalty of the injunction bond, with condition to prosecute the appeal with effect, or to pay all such debt, interest, damages and costs, for which the security in the injunction bond was bound; and also ail costs in the Court of Appeals. And in such cases, the security in the appeal bond shall be answerable over to the security in the injunction bond, for the amount due at the time of the appeal, in case he shall have paid and satisfied the same; for which purpose, the security in the injunction bond is permitted to institute suit on the bond in the name of the creditor, to recover the amount so paid.
In the case under consideration, an injunction to a judgment had been dissolved, and the plaintiff in the injunction desiring to appeal, the effect of the order was suspended for sixty days, within which he obtained and perfected the appeal. In the Court of Appeals, the order dissolving the injunction was affirmed ; and the clerk of the Court where the judgment was obtained, having included damages in the execution from the time the injunction was awarded, to the period when the order of dissolution was affirmed, the execution was quashed ; and the question is presented, whether the damages should be calculated up to the period of affirmance in the Court of Appeals, or the time of dissolving the injunction ; and its resolution depends upon the con
The claim to damages accruing between the time of the dissolution of the injunction and the affirmance in the Appellate Court, cannot, according to this decision, be sustained under the provisions of the law regulating appeals. If sustained at all, it must be under the act giving damages upon the dissolution of an injunction ; that gives them from the time the injunction was awarded until the dissolution. In Wood v. Dwight, 7 John.
The case of Woodson v. Johns, 3 Munf. 230, was a suit on a bond dated in 1791, before the passage of the act allowing damages upon the dissolution of an injunction, and is consequently no authority upon the question of damages. But by the law, as it then stood, the party obtaining the injunction, was to give bond with condition, amongst other things, to pay all such costs as should be awarded against him in case the injunction should be dissolved. Revision of 1792, page 95, § 56.
By the act passed since 1791, damages from the time of awarding the injunction to the dissolution, are to be paid; and the party obtaining the injunction, must give bond for paying to the plaintiff at law the money due, &c., and all such costs and damages as shall be awarded against him in case the injunction be dissolved. The case of Woodson v. Johns, decided that the security was not liable for the costs of the Appellate Court, though awarded by its judgment; and, a fortiori, it would seem, that damages could not be recovered which the Appellate Court does not award. The decision in that case, as to the costs, is in principle conclusive as to the damages allowed by subsequent laws.
This seems to have been the legislative construction of the previous acts, when, by the act of February 27, 1828, Sup. Eev. Code, p. 126, §. 3, provision was made for the indemnity of the security in the injunction bond. The intention was to give full indemnity, and is so declared. The first clause requires, that the condition of
The act proceeds upon the impression, that the security in the injunction bond was only bound for the amount due at the time of the appeal; for, having required the condition to be for the payment of all for which the security in the injunction bond was bound, it is unreasonable to suppose that it could have been intended by the next clause to reduce his recovery to a less sum.
This understanding of the Legislature may also account for the fact, that when, by the act of 1831, having taken away the right of arbitrary appeals, it was deemed proper to relieve the appellant from damages beyond legal interest, no change was made in the law respecting damages on the dissolution of the injunction.
It was esteemed to be harsh and oppressive to subject the appellant to damages after he had obtained the sanction of an Appellate Court, or a Judge thereof in vacation, that the appeal was not without probable cause. The same policy would probably have been applied to damages on appeals from orders dissolving injunctions, if the Legislature had not supposed that no such damages were recoverable by the law as it then stood. Upon the whole, though possibly there may have been a different practice in many of the clerks’ offices, I am of opinion that the time of dissolution is the time when the original order was made, and not when it was affirmed in the Court of Appeals. I am therefore for af
Cabell, P. and Daniel, J. concurred in the opinion
Judgment affirmed.
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