Scarborough v. Dugan

Citations

• 10 Cal. 305

Syllabus

<p>It is well settled that a judgment rendered in one State, and upon which suit is instituted in another, is a contract, in the sense of the Constitution.</p> <p>It is not disputed that the law of the forum can regulate the remedy, which, generally speaking, forms no part of the contract, and thus is not within the constitutional interdict. But it is just as well settled that the Legislature has no right so to regulate the remedy as that it shall destroy the contract by denying all means of enforcement. A right without a remedy is, practically, no obligation at all. A contract is just as much impaired by a prohibition to sue upon it, as it is by direct legislative action declaring it void.</p> <p>The Statute of Limitations, therefore, can only be construed to apply to judgments not in esse at the time of the passage of the act of 1855, or as giving two years from the passage of the act within which to sue upon such as were not already barred by the act of 1850.</p>