Coates v. Mackey

Grason, J., delivered the opinion.of the Court. These are cross-appeals — the first taken by Coates and wife, the plaintiffs below, and the second by John A. Mackey, administrator of John Mackey, who was defendant. The first appeal involves the correctness of the ruling of the Court below, on the demurrer of the plaintiffs to the thirteenth plea, and the second involves the correctness of the ruling in sustaining the demurrer, to the tenth and fourteenth pleas. It appears from the record, that John A. Mackey took out. letters of administration on the personal estate of John Mackey, in Chester County, in the State of Pennsylvania, and that the said John A. Mackey, and Arthur A. Mackey took out letters also upon the personal estate of the deceased in Cecil County, in this State.

Coates and wife, the plaintiffs, recovered a judgment against John A. Mackey, the administrator in Pennsylvania, and then brought this suit against John A. Mackey, as administrator in this State, on the judgment so recovered in Pennsylvania. John A. Mackey appeared to the suit and filed fifteen pleas. Issue was joined on the first plea, as also on the special replications filed to the fifth, sixth, seventh, twelfth and fifteenth pleas, and demurrers to all the other pleas, and the twelfth plea was withdrawn, and the demurrers were sustained as to all the pleas to which they were filed except the thirteenth, and was overruled as to it. The case was tried before the Court, without a jury, upon the issues joined, and the findings and judgment of the Court were in favor of the defendant, and both parties appealed.

The case was submitted on briefs, at the April Term, 1880, of this Court, and resulted in the judgment being reversed in June, 1880. Upon a motion for a re-argument filed by the administrator, John A. Mackey, the case was ordered to be re-argued upon notes, which have been filed, and the case has again received our careful consideration. The only question, which we deem it neces ⁴¹⁸ sary to decide, is that which is raised by the plaintiffs’ demurrer to the thirteenth plea. This plea alleges, that John A. Mackey, administrator of John Mackey in Pennsylvania, is not personally liable on the judgment recovered against him by the plaintiffs, in the Court of Common Pleas, in Chester County, in the State of Pennsylvania, on which this suit is brought, of his own goods and chattels, nor amenable, answerable or chargeable in this State, in manner and form as the plaintiffs have declared against him ; nor in Pennsylvania, except de bonis intestatoris; that is to say, of -the goods and chattels of the intestate John Mackey, deceased, there administered upon and under the authority of the tribunals of said State, to which he is alone responsible concerning his said administration, and that he is and was in nowise answerable or liable in said State of Pennsylvania, de bonis pro priis, or of his own estate, goods or chattels, at the time of bringing this suit, or at the time of the rendering of said supposed judgment, on which this suit is founded, or since; and that by the laws of Pennsylvania, and by the Act of the Legislature of that State, of February 24th, 1834, passed before the bringing of the suit upon which the said supposed judgment was founded, and then and still in force and unrepealed, and entitled “ an Act relating to executors and administrators,” it is provided that the “omission of any executor.or administrator to plead to any action, brought against him in his representative character, that he has fully administered the estate of the decedent, or any other matter relative to the assets, shall not be deemed an admission of assets to satisfy the demand made in said action ; also the omission of the plaintiff to reply to any such matters when pleaded, shall not be deemed an admission of the want of assets as aforesaid ; nor shall such omission otherwise