Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 8.djvu/67

WINTBB ». SWINBUBNB. 83 �an original action in the same court in whieh the ancillary bill is filed. It was asked on the argument if the circuit court had only common-law jurisdiction ; and if, as part of the federal judicial Sys- tem, there was a separate court having only chancery juriediction, whether the latter court might not entertain a creditor's bill to enforce a judgment reoovered in the court of law. Undoubtedly, that would depend upon the constitutional and statutory authority conferred upon the court having exclusive chancery powers. �But as a more effectuai test, suppose, for example, the case in the district court, upon which the present bill is based, had been one between two citizens of Michigan, and there had been an appeal to the circuit court, followed by affirmance of the judgment of the district court. Could it be claimed that the libellant could file a creditor's bill, in the circuit court of Michigan, to enforce satisfaction of the judgment or decree in the circuit court of Wisconsin ? , Obviously not ; and yet the jurisdiction of circuit courts of different circuits is scareely more distinct than that of the circuit and district courts of the same district. The fact that the same judge may hold both the circuit and district courts does not, of course, make them the same court, nor give them any nearer connection than they would have if held by different judges in different localities in, the same district; and therefore it will not do to say that the judgment of the district court was the judgment of a federal court, and that ihe present bill filed in the circuit court is a bill pending in a. federal court, and so that the two proceedings are in the same court. The two courts, it is true, exist under one System, but they are none the less distinct and separate courts in the exercise of their respective powers and juris- dictions. Indispensable to the exercise of original jurisdiction by the circuit courts, except in certain enumerated cases, is the requisite citi- zenship of the parties ; and the argument, ab inconvenienti, strongly as it was urged by counsel, is not suflBciently potent to overcome the fact that, in view of the considerations already suggested, the present bill must be regarded as an original bill in the circuit court, and that the jurisdiction of that court is absolutely dependent upon such citi- zenship of the parties as does not exist here. �A good deal of stress was laid by counsel on the language used by Judge Blatchford in his opinion in the case of The Blanche Page, 16 Blatchf. 6, wherein he held that a court of admiralty of the United States has no power to enforce a final decree for the payment of money, against sureties, by the sequestration of their property accord- ��� �