Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 6.djvu/230

 218 FEDERAL REPORTER. �p'oint is not necessary to the decision ofthose cases; but the whole discussiou, and the distinctions taken in them, were unnecessary unless the law was so ; and it is so an- nounced by the chief justice. Before these decisions were published I had occasion to examine the question, and came to the conclusion that, within the reasoning of the case of The Sewing Machine Companies, 18 Wall. 553, and of earlier cases, thifi miist be the construction, Tremain v. Amory, Jane, 1879 (MSS.) and see Donahoe y. Mariposa Co. 5 Sawy. 163 ; Ruckman v. Palisade Co. 1 Fed. Eep. 367 ; Bailey v. N. Y. Sav. Bank, 2 Fed. Eep. 14 ; Ruble y. Hyde, 3 Fed. Rep. 330. �It unfortunately is the case that congress has not seen fit to entruBt the circuit courts with power to proceed by attach- ment of property against an absent defendant unless heis an inhabitant of the district where the suit is brought. Toland V. Sprague, 12 Pet. 300. A recent statute gives these courts jurisdiction to enforce a lien npon or claim to, or remove an encumbranee or lien or eloud npon the title to, real or per- sonal property within the district, though the defendants, or some of them, may not be either inhabitants thereof or found therein, first giving notice to the absent defendants. St. 1875, c. 137, § 8; 18 St. 472. But this means a lien or title existing anterior to the suit, and not one caused by the institution of the suit itself. These courts, therefore, have a very limited jurisdiction by foreign attachment: an impor- tant process, which derives its very name from the absence of the defendant, and which the state courts make use of with advantage to plaintifs and without injustice to defend- ants. If, then, a corporation ia a necessary party to a suit for collecting moneys due for unpaid assessments of its stock, or, which is very similar, for capital once paid in, but after- wards improperly divided, this bridge company, which is in- corporated by the state of Missouri, of which state the plaintiff is a citizen, cannot be summoned in as a defendant in the district of Massachusetts. �XJnder the two recent decisions first above cited, the com- pany, if it could be brought before the court in some way, ��� �