Cora Hubbard Williams v. Cora Williams Murdoch and Commonwealth Bank and Trust Company, A Corporation, 350 F.2d 840, 3rd Cir. (1965)
Uploaded by
Scribd Government DocsCora Hubbard Williams v. Cora Williams Murdoch and Commonwealth Bank and Trust Company, A Corporation, 350 F.2d 840, 3rd Cir. (1965)
Uploaded by
Scribd Government Docs350 F.
2d 840
Cora Hubbard WILLIAMS, Appellant,
v.
Cora Williams MURDOCH and Commonwealth Bank and
Trust
Company, a Corporation.
No. 15130.
United States Court of Appeals Third Circuit.
Argued May 17, 1965, Submitted May 27, 1965.
Decided Sept. 20, 1965.
Paul Ginsburg, Pittsburgh, Pa., for appellant.
John Stewart, Raspin, Espenshade, Heins, Erskine & Stewart,
Philadelphia, Pa. (Robert W. Duggan, Grier, Duggan, Hampsey &
Ludwig, Pittsburgh, Pa., on the brief), for appellee.
Before BIGGS, Chief Judge, GANEY, Circuit Judge, and NEALON,
District judge.
BIGGS, Chief Judge.
This suit has been before us on a prior occasion and its nature is fully described
in our earlier opinion, Williams v. Murdoch, 3 Cir., 330 F.2d 745 (1964). It is
an action brought by Mrs. Cora Hubbard Williams against her daughter, Mrs.
Cora Williams Murdoch and Commonwealth Bank and Trust Company, coguardians for Mrs. Williams. In a proceeding brought in the Orphans' Court of
Allegheny County under the Pennsylvania Incompetents' Estates Act of 1951,
50 P.S. 631 et seq., Mrs. Williams was declared incompetent and her daughter
and the trust company were appointed co-guardians for her as stated. In the suit
at bar Mrs. Williams asserted in substance that she was deprived of property
and individual liberties without due process of law in the Pennsylvania
Orphans' Court proceeding. Prior to the earlier appeal the court below held in
substance that the issues presented were res judicata and dismissed the
complaint. We concluded that the defense of res judicata was not applicable
and reversed and remanded the case for appropriate action in the light of our
opinion.
2
Upon remand Mrs. Williams moved for judgment on the pleadings pursuant to
Rule 12(c), Fed.R.Civ.Proc., 28 U.S.C. The court below sua sponte then
entered an order as follows: 'And now, this 11th day of May, 1964, the above
entitled action is hereby remanded to the Orphans' Court of Allegheny County
for proceedings in accordance with the opinion of the Third Circuit Court of
Appeals, a copy of which is attached hereto, together with the mandate issued
pursuant thereto.' Mrs. Williams then moved under Rule 62, 'Stay of
Proceedings to Enforce a Judgment', in effect to correct the order of the court
below last quoted alleging in substance that it was not in accordance with the
opinion and mandate of this court and that the court below was without
authority to 'remand' the case to the Orphans' Court of Allegheny County. The
defendants moved for leave to file an answer to protect the record pursuant to
Rule 6(b), alleging there was an incorrect exhibit attached to their prior answer.
The court below then entered another order as follows: 'And now, this 14th day
of September, 1964, after argument and upon due consideration of plaintiff's
motion for judgment on the pleadings and for summary judgment, and
defendant's motion for leave to file an answer to protect the record, this court,
applying the doctrine of federal abstention, persists in its order of May 11,
1964, remanding the parties in the above case to the Orphans' Court of
Allegheny County for further proceedings made pursuant to the mandate of
United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit dated April 20, 1964, and
the said motions of the plaintiff are denied, and defendant's motion for leave to
file an answer to protect the record is granted.' Mrs. Williams thereupon
appealed again to this court.
We cannot but conclude that the two orders which we have quoted are at best
ambiguous. It is not clear whether the court below was attempting to apply the
doctrine of abstention or to remand the case to the state court, or to do both. In
this connection we point out that the court below failed to retain jurisdiction of
the case pending possible action by the state court. We note also that it does not
appear from the record why the doctrine of abstention is applicable to the case
at bar and the court below has not elucidated its position by an opinion or by
any other means which would give us a clue to the basis for its action.
In exercising the doctrine of abstention in cases in which the original
jurisdiction of the federal courts has been invoked, the United States district
courts may remit the parties to the state courts for appropriate action by those
tribunals, but the United States district courts are without power to order the
state courts to conduct further proceedings. Neither this court nor the court
below has the power to issue mandates either directly or indirectly to state
courts in an action such as that at bar. Despite these ambiguities, the defendants
insist that we must treat the orders of the court below as an exercise of
abstention. This we cannot do, but comment on the arguments made by the
defendants in an attempt to justify their assertion that the application of the
doctrine of abstention is appropriate.1
5
As one justification for treating the quoted orders as an exercise by the court
below of the doctrine of abstention, the defendants contend that this case
'presents to the Federal Court a series of objections regarding initially their
jurisdiction ab initio. * * *'2 The short answer to this is that the exercise of the
abstention power assumes a case properly within the jurisdiction of a United
States district court. Such a court first must have jurisdiction since the
abstention doctrine necessarily involves the discretion to postpone or to decline
the exercise of jurisdiction by the United States district court. Harman v.
Forssenius, 380 U.S. 528, 534, 85 S.Ct. 1177, 1182, 14 L.Ed.2d 50 (1965).
Abstention may be proper 'Where resolution of the federal constitutional
question is dependent upon, or may be materially altered by, the determination
of an uncertain issue of state law * * *.' Ibid. But the question of whether the
United States district court has jurisdiction in the first instance turns solely
upon federal law which is not dependent on state law and which cannot be
altered by it.
The defendants also assert that the exercise of the doctrine of abstention may
avoid the necessity of the court below reaching any issue as to the
constitutionality of the Pennsylvania statutes here involved. However, as we
stated in our prior opinion: 'But it must be pointed out also that nowhere in the
complaint filed in the court below does Mrs. Williams attack the
constitutionality of any of the provisions of the Pennsylvania Incompetents'
Estates Act of 1951.' 330 F.2d at 748.
Nor does it appear that any question of state law is uncertain. The Pennsylvania
Supreme Court in In re Estate of Hicks, 414 Pa. 131, 199 A.2d 283 (1964), has
held that personal service is required under the Pennsylvania Act. The
defendants' argument that Hicks is not controlling because it was decided under
the Incompetents' Estates Act of 1955 while the case at bar is controlled by the
Incompetents' Estates Act of 1951 appears to be lacking in merit. An
examination of 50 P.S. 1681 (Act of 1951) with 50 P.S. 3301 (Act of 1955)
reveals no substantial change of language and, what is more important, no
change at all in the provisions dealing with notice. In addition an examination
of the authorities cited by the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania in Hicks reveals
that no new legal doctrine was laid down in that case, it being well-settled
Pennsylvania law that personal service is required.
It may be, however, that the doctrine of abstention is applicable to the case at
bar, and it may well be also that upon an adequate showing the court below
may decide properly to exercise that discretion. Nonetheless, 'The line drawn
should be bright and clear, so that litigants shunted from federal to state courts
by application of the abstention doctrine will not be exposed, not only to
unusual expense and delay, but also to procedural traps operating to deprive
them of their right to a District Court determination of their federal claims.'
England v. Louisiana State Board of Medical Examiners, 375 U.S. 411, 418, 84
S.Ct. 461, 466, 11 L.Ed.2d 440 (1964).3
In view of the ambiguities, patent and latent, in the case at bar growing out of
the orders of the court above quoted, and from the record itself, we are
constrained to remand the case again to the end that the court below may
reconsider whether the doctrine of abstention is applicable, consistent with the
guidelines laid down by the Supreme Court in its recent decision in Harman v.
Forssenius, supra. Accordingly, the orders of the court below will be vacated
and the cause remanded to it for the purposes indicated.
It should be made clear that the grounds advanced are those of the defendants
and are not necessarily the grounds on which the court below proceeded. As we
have stated we are not informed as to the latter
See appellees' brief, p. 5
Citing at note 9, Cf. Wright, The Abstention Doctrine Reconsidered, 37
Tex.L.Rev. 815, 825 (1959)
