I heard an apocryphal story years ago that the late Supreme Court Justice William O. Douglas had stolen the papers relating to the Santa Clara decision and used them to start a fire for a weenie roast. This little story may have also made it into print; in one version or another over the years.
Your email pal,
Tom L.
Rkmickey at aol.com wrote:
> The following is an excerpt concerning the Santa Clara case and related cases
> from THE OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES DEVISE HISTORY OF THE SUPREME COURT OF THE
> UNITED STATES, VOL. VII, RECONSTRUCTION AND REUNION 1864-88, PART TWO, by
> Charles Fairman (NY & London, 1987). I have omitted all but two footnotes
> and incorporated those in the text.
> K. Mickey
>
> SOME DECISIONS ON CORPORATIONS
>
> "I suppose ... that neither the framers of the Constitution nor the
> framers of the Judiciary Act had corporations in view." So ex-Justice
> Benjamin R Curtis began in a lecture to his class in Federal Jurisdiction at
> the Harvard Law School in 1872-73. Yet from necessity, served by the use of
> fictions, it had come to be settled that " A suit by or against a corporation
> in it corporate name may be presumed to be a suit by or against citizens of
> the State which created the corporate body, and no averment or denial to the
> contrary is admissible for the purpose of withdrawing the suit from the
> jurisdiction of a court of the United States.
> With equal truth one may add that the framers of the Fourteenth
> Amendment did not have corporations in view. That indispensable institution
> had to be fitted into the Amendment whose immediate purpose was to establish
> and protect the new class of freedmen in their rights as citizens. How far
> corporation would be entitled to protection under the Amendment was on of
> those question left "to the gradual process of judicial inclusion and
> exclusion." Whe Chief Justice Waite said in Union Pacific R.R. v. United
> States, the Sinking Fund Case, that the United States "equally with the
> States ... are prohibited from depriving persons or corporations of property
> without due process of law," he expressed shat seemed implicit in the
> Amendment.
> A test came in California, which had adopted a new constiution in
> 1879, designed to reduce the power of railroad interests. Property owned by
> individuals was to be taxed upon its value, minus the amount of any mortgage
> or other incumbrance, which was to be taxed to the holder. For a railroad,
> however, the mortgage which was to be included in the amount to be taxed.
> (They were so heavily mortgaged that, were it otherwise, they would largely
> have excaped this levy.) Furthermore, the franchise, roadway, roadbed, and
> rolling stock of a railroad operating in more than one county would be assed
> at actual value, and apportioned by mileage to the municipal units, to be
> fixed by the Board of Equalization, without notice or hearing.
> In April 1882 County of San Mateo v. Southern Pacific R.R. was
> brought in a state court for a year's taxes . . . .
>
> When the case came to trial before (Justice) Field and Circuit Judge
> Sawyer, counsel for the defendant railroad argued that the discrimination in
> the mode of assesment offended the equal protection clause, while the absence
> of notice and hearing was a denial of due process.
> Judgement for the defendant came on September 25, 1882. Because of
> the great importance of the constitutional question, decision of companion
> cases was stayed; it was pointed out that a writ of error, in the San Mateo
> case, if filed immediately, might be heard at the coming term of the Court.
> That was done; the case was received on October 13, promptly
> advanced, and given a hearing on De4cember 19-21, 1882.
> An unusual feature among the elaborate arguments was that by Roscoe
> Conkling for the railroad. He produced a copy of the "Journal of the joint
> committee of the Fifteen " at the First Session of the 39th Congress wihere
> the Fourteenth Amendment was framed, and gave a novel twist to his account.
> The Amendment had not been designed exclusively for the benefit of freedmen.
> Individuals and joint-stock companies, he said, had appealed to Congress for
> protection from invidious and discriminating state and local taxes. The
> Amendment gave security "to all persons in every State." "The great ordinance
> [shoul] never be dwarfed into a mere remedy for a single wrong"; "it operates
> upon association of indivuals," that was to say , upon corporations. He
> closed by repeating Waite's affirmation in the Sinking Fund Case, quoted
> above.
> The performance was contrived and misleading; to Field, "It was a
> great argument . . . . The written pages want the fire of the speaker which
> warmed and illuminated everything that was said." Years later, Conkling's
> seeming disclosure of a secret purpose of the Committee led some historians
> for a time to accept the "Conspiracy Theory" of the Amendment. [Accute and
> penetrating discussion of this, the "corporate personality," and the
> influence of Justice Field figured in most of the articles brought together
> in Howard Jay Graham's "Everyman's Constitution" (Madison: State Historical
> Society of Wisconsin, 1962) The text of Conkling's argument is set out in an
> Appendix at 595-610.]
> Notwithstanding the major effort of counsel, no decision was
> forthcoming: as recorded in the Chief Justice's Docket Book, on January 29,
> 1883, the San Mateo case was postponed to a later term.
> Meanwhile in California suits were brought by the State and by Santa
> Clara and Sacramento counties against several railroads to collect taxes. . .
> . .
> Reverting now to the pending San Mateo case, the railroad
> company had paid that county's claim, and the parties submitted to the
> Supreme Court that the case brought by Santa Clara County against the same
> railroad would present all issues involved, and that their case should be
> dismissed. On December 21, 1885 it was so ordered.
> Shortly thereafter, on January 26, 18886, County of Santa Clara and
> companion cases were reached for argument. At the outset the Chief Justice
> made an announcement to the effect that
>
> The Court does not wish to hear argument on the question
> whether the provision in the
> Fourteenth Amendment ... which forbids a State to deny any person
> within its jurisdiction the equal
> protection of the laws, applied to these Corporation. We are all of
> opinion that it does.
>
> Dr. Magrath's "Waite" gives the text of the exchange between the
> Reporter and the Chief Justice leading to this announcement..
> The Court had had ample time to mature its view since the argument in
> San Mateo in December 1882, and evidently saw no need to go through the
> exercise again. Moreover, it was immaterial for the dispostion of Santa
> Clara. As Justice Harlan developed in his opion for the Court, plantiff's
> demand was for an entire tax laid upon different classes of property, not
> distinct and seperable, and in part beyond the authority of the state Board
> of Equalization. The assesment was invalid under local law.
> Justice Field concurred, but regretted that the Court had not deemed
> it consistent with its duty to decide the important constitutional question
> of equal protection.
> Much has been said about the unusual way in which the conclusion of
> the consitutional status of corporations was announced. The report of the
> decision in Missouri Pacific Ry. v. Humes [115 U.S. 512] makes the
> announcement seem less notable.
> A Missouri statute ...(provided) that for injury to animals the
> company would be liable to double damages..... Counsel for the company argued
> that the railroad corporation was a person with the Fourteenth Amendment, and
> that double damages to make a donation denied due process and equal
> protection. .... The Minutes record what transpired:
>
> The argument of these cases was commenced by Mr. A.B. Browne
> of counsel for
> the plantiff in error.
> The Court announced that it did not desire to hear further
> argument in these cases.
>
> Justice Field delivered the Court's opinion. He quoted Miller's
> remarks in Davidson v. New Orleans on "some strange misconception of the
> scope" of the Due Process Clause, and the wisdom of "the gradual process of
> judicial inclusion and exlusion." After the lapse of eight years there might
> well be "increased surprise" at these cases. It was the duty of the State to
> redress private wrongs, and Missouri's statute was notable beneficent. The
> legislature might impose double damages, and there was no valid objection
> that the sufferer instead of the State received them.
> How did the Court decide to cut off further argument? The records
> are silent, but quite like the Chief Justice polled the Justices by passing a
> paper along the bench.