Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 2.djvu/753

 746 PEDEBAL REPORTER. �ties "shall be liable on their bond for ail damages and costs occasioned by the attachment, or any subsequent proceedings connected therewith." The most that oan be said is that the amount in controversy in the question raised upon the valid- ity of the attachaient is the sum -which the defendant may reeover as damages resulting from the wrongf ul issuing of the writ. What that amount is nowhere appears. The defend- ant has made no formai claim for damages. He prays the return of the goods sued, and for judgment for costs only. If we were at liberty to enter into conjecture as to the proba- ble amount of the damages, ia case the attachment is set aside, there is no data in the record from which we could, with any certain ty, estimate them at more than $500. The defendant's property was taken by attachment, (wrongfuUy, if the plea in abatement be true ;) but it was taken to be ap- plied upon a honafide indebtedness. �What bis damages would be might depend upon a variety of facts and circumstanees which cannot be anticipated. But the court, in determining such a question as this, must not be left to speculation. The party moving for a removal must be able to show affirmatively that the sum in controversy exceeds $500, exclusive of costs. It is enough to say, in this case, that this does not appear. No sum is claimed as dam- ages, and from aught that appears it may not be the inten- tion of the defendant to claim damages. If he should here- after, by proper pleading, in this case, or in a suit on the attachment bond, claim more than $500 damages, in the state court, I think his making such claim will constitute a case which can be removed ; but no such claim has heretofore been made. The petition for removal evidently refers to the original cause, which, aa we bave seen, ceased to be a dispute or controversy the moment the defendant admitted ail that the plaintiffs claimed. I have treated it, however, as apply- iug to the issue raised by the plea in abatement, in order that I might dispose of the question upon the most favorable view for the plaintiffs. Strictly speaking, the application feU to the ground when the defendant's admission of the plaintiffs* «laim was filed, and a new application for the removal of the ����