US SUPREME COURT DECISIONS

An action was commenced in a court of the South Carolina against plaintiff in error and other defendants. Plaintiff in error, after an answer prepared and signed by counsel had been filed in which it was stated that she was a citizen of New York, petitioned for its removal to the Circuit Court of the United States on the ground of a separable controversy, alleging that she was a citizen of Massachusetts, that plaintiffs below were citizens of New York, except one, a citizen or subject of Spain, and that the other defendants below were citizens of different states named other than Massachusetts. The state court disallowed the petition for removal on the ground that it appeared from the answer that plaintiff in error was a citizen of New York. Held that this question was one of fact to be determined by the circuit court of the United States, and not by the state court; that plaintiff in error was not estopped by the answer from setting up that she was a citizen of New York, and that, as a case for removal was made out on the face of the petition, the petition was improperly denied.

Stone v. South Carolina, 117 U. S. 430, affirmed. chanrobles.com-red

Page 118 U. S. 280

On the proof, the Court is satisfied that plaintiff in error was, when the suit was commenced, and continued to be, a citizen of Massachusetts, and that on her petition the cause should have been removed to the circuit court of the United States.

The Court also holds, on an examination of the record and the proof and the Code of South Carolina, that the petition for the removal in this case was made "at the term at which the cause could first be tried" according to the meaning of that phrase as construed in Babbit v. Clark, 103 U. S. 606, and Pullman Palace Car Co. v. Speck, 113 U. S. 84.

The case is stated in the opinion of the Court.