tions where there is property of the insolvent. In such case, as in the corresponding case of administrators, the two receivers are not in privity, and a judgment obtained against one in the State of his appointment will not be binding upon the other." The ancillary receiver, after settling with the creditors within his jurisdiction, is accountable to the principal receiver for the balance, as in other cases of administration.

§ 118. Suits by and against Receivers. A receiver, strictly speaking, has no more right to sue in a foreign State than to do any other act. But if a suit instituted by a foreign receiver will not work a detriment or an injustice to the citizens of the forum, he will generally, upon principles of comity, be permitted to appeal to its courts.1

And upon going into a foreign jurisdiction, or sending the trust property thither, he will be protected by the courts of that State in his right to the property which, in the performance of his duty, he has carried or sent thither. In such cases the courts, while protecting their own citizens from wrong, will not permit them to infringe the comity of nations and themselves perpetrate a wrong upon the receiver and the court that has appointed him.2

In respect to suits instituted against receivers, it is a general rule that these officials cannot be sued without the leave of the appointing court. A suit instituted without such leave is a contempt of the appointing court, which, if it can reach the plaintiff's person, may restrain him by an injunction or attach

16 Farmers' Loan & T. Co. v. Tel. Co., 148 N. Y. 315, 325, 31 L. R. A. 403, 42 N. E. 707; Reynolds v. Stockton, 140 U. S. 255.

17 Reynolds v. Stockton, 140 U. S. 255.

1 Booth v. Clark, 17 How. 322; Gilman v. Ketcham, 84 Wis. 60, 54 N. W. 395, 397; Boulware v. Davis, 90 Ala. 207, 9 L. R. A. 602, 6 Am. St. Rep. 189; Petersen v. Chemical Bank, 32 N. Y. 21, 43, 88 Am. Dec. 298; Toronto, etc. Trust Co. v. R. R. Co., 123 N. Y. 37, 47, 25 N. E. 198; Woodward v. Brooks, 128 Ill. 222, 20 N. E. 685; Humphreys v. Hopkins, 81 Cal. 551, 6 L. R. A. 792; Catlin v. Wilcox Plate Co., 123 Ind. 477, 8 L. R. A. 62.

2 Pond v. Cooke, 45 Conn. 126, 29 Am. Rep. 668; Chicago, etc. R. R. Co. v. Packet Co., 108 Ill. 317, 48 Am. Rep. 557; Cagill v. Wooldridge, 8 Baxt. (Teun.) 580, 35 Am. Rep. 716. But see Humphreys v. Hopkins, 81 Cal. 551, 6 L. R. A. 792.

him for contempt, or both, or may render the proceedings instituted by the plaintiff of no effect within its jurisdiction. Such is the view taken by the courts of the State where the receiver is appointed.

Whether or not a foreign court will take the same view if a creditor attempts to seize the property of the insolvent in its jurisdiction without leave of the court appointing the receiver, is a matter about which there is some conflict of opinion. It would seem quite clear that such foreign court would not regard the appointment of the receiver in cases where its own citizens attach the property within its jurisdiction.*

But opinion is divided upon the question whether citizens of the State where the receiver is appointed shall be permitted to disregard the orders and jurisdiction of their own home courts, and without their leave sue the receiver in another State. Some of the courts take the view that want of leave to sue the receiver is not a jurisdictional defect; but that such suit may be maintained, the plaintiff taking the risk of the appointing court being able to reach him effectively by injunction or contempt proceedings.5 But the more recent and the better opinion is in favor of denying to foreign courts all jurisdiction of suits by home creditors against a home receiver appointed by the home courts, without the latter's leave first obtained."

3 Winswall v. Sampson, 14 How. 65; Peale v. Phipps, 14 How. 368; Davis v. Gray, 16 Wall. 203; Barton v. Barbour, 104 U. S. 126; Farmers' Loan & T. Co. v. Tel. Co., 148 N. Y. 315, 31 L. R. A. 403, 42 N. E. 707.

• Catlin v. Wilcox Plate Co., 123 Ind. 477, 8 L. R. A. 62; Boulware v. Davis, 90 Ala. 207, 9 L. R. A. 602, 6 Am. St. Rep. 189; Booth v. Clark, 17 How. 322; Reynolds v. Adden, 136 U. S. 353, 354. It is believed also that the same rule will prevail where the attaching creditors are citizens of States other than that where the receiver is appointed. Cole v. Cunningham, 133 U. S. 107, 127. See post, § 138.

↳ Kinney v. Crocker, 18 Wis. 74; St. Joseph, etc. R. R. Co. v. Smith, 19 Kan. 225; Allen v. Central R. R. Co., 42 Ia. 683.

• Barton v. Barbour, 104 U. S. 126, 128; Peale v. Phipps, 14 How. 368; Kennedy v. R. R. Co., 3 Fed. 97; Melendy v. Barbour, 78 Va. 544, 558; Gil· man v. Ketcham, 84 Wis. 60, 54 N. W. 395. See post, § 138.

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PART IV.

SITUS OF PERSONAL PROPERTY.

§ 119. Preliminary - Outline of Discussion.

- It has already been observed that the legal and the actual situs of land or immovable property, by reason of the quality of immovability, are one and the same. By no fiction of law nor theory of public policy can land be regarded as constructively located at any other place than its actual situs. It naturally follows that every question affecting the title to land must be governed by the law of the place where the land is situated.1

But with that class of property known as personal property it is otherwise. Tangible chattels are movable, and may be carried or sent from one State to another, and therefore may at different times be subjected to different laws at the will or caprice of the owner. By reason of its movability, personal property cannot be said to have any fixed and definite locality like lands. And if this is true of tangible chattels, how much more true is it of those intangible interests known as choses in action, or debts. These cannot be said in strictness to have any situs at all.

Yet it is essential, for the purposes of business, that some situs should be assigned to all these classes of property. They are as susceptible of being dealt with in the ordinary transactions of life as real property; in fact transactions with respect to them are much more frequent. Such transactions must be measured by some law, and that law can only be furnished by the situs of the property and of the transactions relating to it.

We shall devote the next chapter to a consideration of the rules by which to determine the situs of tangible chattels and 1 Ante, §§ 11, 12.

debts, and in the succeeding chapters we will inquire into "the proper law" governing the various transactions that may arise with regard to personal property, including (1) voluntary transfers of personalty inter vivos; (2) involuntary transfers of personalty inter vivos; (3) transfers by succession to an intestate's personal estate; (4) transfers by will.

CHAPTER X.

SITUS OF CHATTELS AND OF DEBTS.

Be

§ 120. Legal and Actual Situs of Tangible Chattels. cause of their characteristic of movability, it has been a timehonored maxim both of the common and the Roman law, arising from considerations of general convenience, that chattels are to be presumed in legal contemplation to follow the situs of the owner, since it is always in his power to carry or have them sent thither. This maxim is expressed in the phrase, "Mobilia personam sequuntur.”

As was said by an eminent English judge," "It is a clear proposition, not only of the law of England, but of every country in the world where the law has the resemblance of 7 science, that personal property has no locality. The meaning

of that is, not that personal property has no visible locality, but that it is subject to that law which governs the person of the owner. With respect to the disposition of it, with respect to the transmission of it, either by succession or act of the party, it follows the law of the person."

2

The legal situs of chattels then is the situs of the owner. But, as has been shown in a previous section, the owner may possess, for different purposes, two different localities at the same time. For some purposes, the actual situs of the person at a given time will furnish the applicatory law (though he resides in another State). For other purposes, the legal situs (or domicil) of the party will furnish the proper law.

It will be remembered also that the actual situs of the person is looked to whenever the transaction to which the law of his situs is applied is voluntarily and deliberately entered into by

1 Lord Loughborough, in Sill v. Worswick, 1 H. Bl. 690.

2 Ante, § 18.