Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 5.djvu/562

 550 FISDEBA.Ii BEFOBTEB. �of any state, nor is the defendant described as a corporation of any state. The assumption of the defendant is that the plaintiflf has sued the Louisiana corporation, but it might just as well be assumed that she has sued the Mississippi, Ten- nessee, or Kentucky corporation, for anything appearing to the contrary in her pleadiugs or the record she has made. �The petition for removal avers that the defendant is a cor- poration of Louisiana, and the plaintiff a citizen of Kentucky; and while the plea in abatement, in terma, admits this, it further avers that the defendant is a Kentucky corporation, and the fact is so. Now, a plaintiff in the institution of a suit may ordinarily choose the party to be sued, and if she has, in this case, chosen to sue the Kentucky corporation, there seems to be no reason why it shall be assumed that she is suing a corporation of another state. If she had described the defendant as a corporation of Louisiana in her suit, per- haps the right of removal might cxist; but, in the absence of any indication of an intention on her part to sue a non-resi- dent corporation, it would be a fair inference that she waa suing the Kentucky corporation and not the others. How- ever this may be, wo are a court sitting in Kentucky, and find here a corporation, under the laws of Kentucky, sued in the courts of that state, and cannoi^, I think, assume, in favor of our jurisdiction, that another corporation identical in name, and the persons composing it chartered by another state, is the one sued by the plaintiff. A court sitting in Kentucky should rather assume, nothing appearing to the contrary, that it is the home corporation that is sued. The fiction on which we proceed here establishes conchisively that this Kentucky corporation is composed exclusively of citizens of that state, and the laws of other states cannot operate to make it other- wise. It appears to me a necessary resuit that this court has no jurisdiction. Eemand the cause. �NoTB. See C. e W. I. R. Co. v. L. S. £ M. S. Ry. Co., ante, 19. ����