American Bridge Co. v. Hunt

Citations

• 130 F. 302
• 14 Ohio F. Dec. 713
• 1904 U.S. App. LEXIS 4158

Syllabus

<p>1. Removal of Causes — Federal Courts — Jurisdiction—Determination.</p> <p>In a suit removed from the state to the federal courts it is the duty of the latter at any stage of the litigation to dismiss or remand the suit on a defect of federal jurisdiction being made to appear, whether the question is raised by the parties or not.</p> <p>2. Same — Diversity of Citizenship — Joint Defendants — Separable Controversy.</p> <p>Where an action for wrongful death is brought in a state court against a foreign corporation and certain of its officers and servants whose citizenship was the same as the plaintiff’s, the right of the corporation to remove the suit to the federal courts depended on whether the record at the time of the removal disclosed a separable controversy.</p> <p>3. Joint Defendants — Concurring Acts of Negligence — Defenses.</p> <p>Where plaintiff, in an action for death, pleaded a cause of action against several defendants, some of whom were of the same citizenship as plaintiff, the test of plaintiff’s right to join such defendants, and thereby preclude a removal of the cause to the federal courts by defendants whose citizenship was diverse, depended on whether there was a legal concert or identity of the defendants in the same tortious act, or in the concurring acts of negligence contributing to the same injury, and not whether such defendants might present separate and different defenses to the action.</p> <p>4. Same-^Joint.Acts of Negligence — Pleading.</p> <p>Where, in an action for wrongful death of plaintiff’s intestate, the complaint joined the co-employe by whose alleged negligence plaintiff’s intestate was killed, whose citizenship was the same as that of plaintiff, with decedent’s employer, which was a foreign corporation, and alleged that such corporation was negligent in supplying an electric crane which was not equipped with good and sufficient brakes or other appliances by which it might be controlled, in consequence of which an iron beam be