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else, that can only be shown by the return of service, or by appearance.

Neither can a court render judgment against a party who has not appeared, without some evidence of jurisdiction.

3. JURISDICTION.

SHELDON V. NEWTON, Supreme Court of Ohio, 1854 (3 Ohio St. 494).

Ranney, J. . . . I. A settled axiom of the law furnishes the governing principles by which these proceedings are to be tested. If the court had jurisdiction of the subject-matter and, the parties, it is altogether immaterial how grossly irregular, or manifestly erroneous its proceedings may have been; its final order can not be regarded as a nullity, and can not, therefore, be collaterally impeached. On the other hand, if it proceeded without jurisdiction, it is equally unimportant how technically correct, and precisely certain, in point of form, its record may appear; its judgment is void to every intent, and for every purpose, and must be so declared by every court in which it is presented. In the one case, the court is invested with the power to determine the rights of the parties, and no irregularity or error in the execution of the power, can prevent its judgment, while it stands unreversed, from disposing of such rights as fall within the legitimate scope of its adjudication while in the other, its authority is wholly usurped, and its judgments and orders the exercise of arbitrary power under the forms, but without the sanction, of law. The power to hear and determine a cause is jurisdiction; and it is coram judice whenever a case is presented which brings this power into action. But before this power can be affirmed to exist it must be made to appear that the law has given the tribunal capacity to entertain the complaint against the person or thing sought to be charged or affected; that such complaint has actually been preferred; and that such person or thing has been properly brought before the tribunal, to answer the charge therein contained. When these appear, the jurisdiction has attached; the right to hear and determine is perfect; and the decision of every question thereafter arising is but the exercise of the jurisdiction thus conferred; and whether determined rightfully or wrongfully, correctly or erroneously, is alike immaterial to the validity, force, and effect of the final judgment, when brought

llaterally in question. United States v. Arredondo, 6 Pet. 709; Rhode Island v. Massachusetts, 12 Pet. 718.

We wholly dissent from the position taken in argument, that the jurisdiction of the court, or the effect of its final order, can be made to depend upon the records disclosing such a state of facts to have been shown in evidence, as to warrant the exercise of its authority. To adopt the language of the court, in answer to the same position, in Voorhes v. The United States Bank, 10 Pet. 473: "We can not hesitate in giving a distinct and unqualified negative to this proposition, both on principle and authority too well and long settled to be questioned." It was distinctly repudiated in the early case of Ludlow's Heirs v. Johnston, 3 Ohio, 560; and has been no less positively denied in every subsequent case, including Adams v. Jeffries, 12 Ohio, 253. The tribunal in which these proceedings were had, was a court of record, of general common-law and chancery jurisdiction; and while it is true, that in the exercise of this particular authority, it may be regarded as a tribunal of special and limited powers prescribed by statute, it is still to be remembered, that it was the tribunal created by the constitution, with exclusive jurisdiction over probate and testamentary matters, and had no one single characteristic of those inferior courts and commissions, to which the rule insisted upon has been applied by the English and American courts. All its proceedings are recorded, and constitute records, in the highest sense of the term, importing absolute verity, not to be impugned by averment or proof to the contrary, and conclusively binding the parties, and all who stand in privity with them. The distinction is not between courts of general and those of limited jurisdiction, but between courts of record, that are so constituted as to be competent to decide on their own jurisdiction, and to exercise it to a final judgment without setting forth the facts and evidence on which it is rendered, and whose records, when made, import absolute verity; and those of an inferior grade, whose decisions are not of themselves evidence, and whose judgments can be looked through for the facts and evidence which are necessary to sustain them. McCormick v. Sullivant, 10 Wheat. 199; Griswold v. Sedwick, I Wend. 131; Baldwin v. Hale, 17 Johns. 272; Grignous Lessee v. Astor, 2 How. 341; 2 Binn. 255; 4 Ib. 187.

HUNT V. HUNT, Court of Appeals of New York, 1878 (72 N. Y. 217).

Folger, J.: .

J... . We come now to consider the question of the jurisdiction of the court.

It is plain that every State has the right to determine the status, or domestic and social condition of persons domiciled within its territory. Strader v. Graham, 10 How. (U. S.) 82; Cheever v. Wilson, 9 Wall. 108; Barber v. Root, 10 Mass. 260; Kinnier v. Kinnier, supra. So it is that every State may determine for itself for what causes that status may be changed or affected, and hence upon what grounds, based upon what acts or omissions of persons holding the relation to each other of marriage, they may be separated and that relation dissolved; and it may prescribe what legal proceedings shall be had to that end, and what courts of its sovereignty shall have jurisdiction of the matrimonial status and power to adjudge a dissolution of that relation. All citizens of that State, domiciled within it and owing to it allegiance, are bound by the laws and regulations which it prescribes in that respect. When, without infringement of the Constitution of the State, its statutes have conferred upon any of its courts the general power to act judicially upon the matrimonial status of its citizens, or of persons within its territorial limits, and to adjudge a dissolution of the relation of husband and wife; then, we take it, such court has jurisdiction of the subject-matter of divorce. A text-writer of repute says, that "it is the act or acts which constitute the cause of action," which "is the subject-matter in a suit for divorce.". See 3 Am. Law Reg. (N. S.) 206. And in Holmes v. Holmes, 4 Lans. 388, the learned and able judge who delivered the opinion of the court speaks of the acts relied upon to obtain a divorce as being the subject-matter. The definitions of lexicographers imply a broader scope to the phrase, a more general meaning. It is: "The cause; the object; the thing in dispute." Bouvier's Law Dict. "The matter or thought presented for consideration in some statement or discussion.” Webster's Dict. Power given by law to a court, to adjudge divorces from the ties of matrimony, does give jurisdiction of the subjectmatter of divorce. Though the proceedings before that court, from first to last of the testimony, in an application for divorce, should show that a state of facts does not exist which makes a legal cause for divorce, yet it cannot be said that the court has not jurisdiction of the subject-matter; that it has not power to entertain the pro

ceeding, to hear the proofs and allegations, and to determine upon their sufficiency and legal effect. Then jurisdiction of the subjectmatter does not depend upon the ultimate existence of a good cause of action in the plaintiff in the particular case. See Groenvelt v. Burwell, 1 Ld. Raym. 465, 467. A court may have jurisdiction of all actions in assumpsit, of that subject-matter. An action by A, in which judgment is demanded against B as the indorser of a promissory note, falls within that jurisdiction. Such court may entertain and try the action, and give a valid and effectual judgment in it. Though it should appear in proof that there had never been presentment and demand, nor notice of non-payment, yet a judgment for A against B, though against the facts, without the facts to sustain it, would not be void as rendered without jurisdiction. It would be erroneous and liable to reversal on review. Until reviewed and reversed, it would be valid and enforceable against B, and entitled to credit when brought in play collaterally. If given by such a court in a sister State against one of whose person that court had jurisdiction, it would be a judgment which the courts of this State would be bound to credit and enforce. Jurisdiction of the subject-matter is power to adjudge concerning the general question involved, and is not dependent upon the state of facts which may appear in a particular case, arising, or which is claimed to have arisen, under that general question. One court has jurisdiction in criminal cases; another in civil cases; each in its sphere has jurisdiction of the subject-matter. Yet the facts, the acts of the party proceeded against, may be the same in a civil case, as in a criminal case-as, for instance, in a civil action for false and fraudulent representations and deceit, and in a criminal action for obtaining property by false pretenses. We should not say that the court of civil powers had jurisdiction of the criminal action, nor vice versa, though each had power to pass upon allegations of the same facts. So that there is a more general meaning to the phrase "subjectmatter," in this connection, than power to act upon a particular state of facts. It is the power to act upon the general, and so to speak, the abstract question, and to determine and adjudge whether the particular facts presented call for the exercise of the abstract power. A suitor for a judgment of divorce may come into any court of the State in which he is domiciled, which is empowered to entertain a suit therefor, and to give judgment between husband and wife of a dissolution of their married state. If he does not

establish a cause for divorce, jurisdiction to pronounce judgment does not leave the court. It has power to give judgment that he has not made out a case. That judgment would be valid and effectual as to bind him thereafter, and to be res adjudicata as to him in another like attempt by him. If that court, however, should err, and give judgment that he had made out his case, jurisdiction remains in it so to do. The error is to be corrected in that very action. It may not be shown collaterally to avoid the judgment, while it stands unreversed, whether the judgment be availed of in the State of its rendition, or a sister State; granted always that there has been jurisdiction of the parties to it. The judgment is in such case, also, res adjudicata against the party cast in judgment. The relevancy of this discussion will appear when we come to consider more particularly some of the points made by the plaintiff. We conclude that jurisdiction of the subject-matter is the power lawfully conferred to deal with the general subject involved in the action.

RANEY V. MCRAE, Supreme Court of Georgia, 1854 (-14 Ga. 589). Lumpkin, J.: But it is further insisted that this judgment is a nullity for want of jurisdiction in the court to give it. And this exception is founded on the fact that the declaration does not aver that the defendants resided in Stewart county.

Parties can not by consent, whether express or implied, confer jurisdiction over the subject-matter. Titles to land must be tried in the superior court, and in the county where they lie. But it is otherwise as to the person. The provision in the constitution fixing the residence of the defendant as the place of trial guarantees a personal privilege, which may be waived.

MARSDEN V. SOPER, Supreme Court of Ohio, 1860 (11 Ohio St. 503).

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Brinkerhoff, J.: . The only question arising on the record, which we deem it worth while to notice, is the question whether the court of common pleas had jurisdiction of the persons of the defendants below, so as to authorize that court to take cognizance of, and to render a judgment in the case affecting their rights.

It will be noticed that the plaintiff in this judgment is not the payce of the note on which judgment is taken, but an indorsee; and that the warrant of attorney under which judgment was confessed, purports to authorize such confession, "in favor of any holder of

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