Opinion of the Court.

In Plymouth Co. v. Amador & Sacramento Co., above cited, a suit by a canal company against a mining corporation and its agents, for polluting a stream of water belonging to the plaintiff, was held to have been rightly remanded to the state court in which it had been commenced, although the corporation's petition for removal alleged that it was the only real defendant, and that the other defendants were nominal parties only, and were sued for the purpose of preventing the corporation from removing the cause into the Circuit Court of the United States. Chief Justice Waite in delivering judgment said: "It is possible, also, that the company may be guilty and the other defendants not guilty; but the plaintiff in its complaint says they are all guilty, and that presents the cause of action to be tried. Each party defends for himself, but until his defence is made out the case stands against him, and the rights of all must be governed accordingly. Under these circumstances, the averments in the petition, that the defendants were wrongfully made [parties] to avoid a removal can be of no avail in the Circuit Court upon a motion to remand, until they are proven; and that, so far as the present record discloses, was not attempted. The affirmative of this issue was on the petitioning defendant. That corporation was the moving party, and was bound to make out its case." 118 U. S. 270, 271.

In Little v. Giles, 118 U. S. 596, where a bill in equity charged the defendants jointly with having fraudulently deprived the plaintiff of her property, Mr. Justice Bradley delivering the opinion of the court said that one of the defendants "could not, by merely making contrary averments in his petition for removal, and setting up a case inconsistent with the allegations of the bill, segregate himself from the other defendants, and thus entitle himself to remove the case into the United States Court." 118 U. S. 600, 601.

So in East Tennessee Railroad v. Grayson, 119 U. S. 240, 244, in a suit in equity against two corporations, the question was whether there was a separable controversy between one of them and the plaintiff which would warrant a removal into the Circuit Court of the United States; and it was said by

Opinion of the Court.

Chief Justice Waite, and adjudged by this court, that the allegations of the bill must, for the purposes of that inquiry, be taken as confessed. To the same effect is Graves v. Corbin, just decided, ante, 571, 585.

In the case at bar, the declaration charged two corporations with having jointly trespassed on the plaintiff's land; whether they had done so or not was a question to be decided at the trial; and it is not contended, and could not be, in the face of the decisions already cited, that the record of the state court, as it stood at the time of the filing of the petition for removal, showed a separable controversy between the plaintiff and either defendant.

The argument in support of the jurisdiction of the Federal Court is that the Louisville and Nashville Railroad Company was the only real defendant, because, at the time of the trespass complained of, the other defendant was not in existence. But this was a matter affecting the merits of the case, and one which the plaintiff was entitled to deny and disprove at the trial upon the issues joined by the pleadings. Both the defendants were sued and served as corporations, and pleaded as such, in the state court; and it is not denied that each of them was a corporation when the action was brought. The question whether one of them was in existence as a corporation at the time of the alleged trespass did not affect the question whether it could be now sued, but the question of its liability in the action; in other words, not the jurisdiction, but the merits, to be determined when the case came to trial. It could not be tried and determined in advance, as incidental to a petition by a codefendant to remove the case into the Circuit Court of the United States.

As to the suggestion, made in argument, that the Southeast and St. Louis Railway Company was fraudulently joined as a defendant in the state court for the purpose of depriving the Louisville and Nashville Railroad Company of the right to remove the case into the Circuit Court of the United States, it is enough to say that no fraud was alleged in the petition for removal, or pleaded, or offered to be proved, in the Circuit Court. Judgment affirmed.

Statement of the Case.

AVERY v. CLEARY.

ERROR TO THE CIRCUIT COURT OF THE UNITED STATES FOR THE

DISTRICT OF MASSACHUSETTS.

No. 162. Argued December 13, 1889. - Decided January 6, 1890.

On the facts, as stated in the opinion of the court, it is held, that this suit is one between an assignee in bankruptcy and one claiming an adverse interest touching the property which is the subject of controversy, within the meaning of Rev. Stat. § 5057, prescribing a limitation for the commencement of such an action.

The omission by a bankrupt to put upon his schedules, or the omission by him or by his administrator to disclose to his assignee in bankruptcy the existence of policies of insurance on his life which had been taken out by him, and had, before the bankruptcy, been assigned to a trustee for the benefit of his daughters, does not amount to a fraudulent concealment of the existence of the policies, so as to take an action against the administrator (who was also guardian of the daughters) to recover from him the amount of insurance paid to him as administrator, out of the operation of the limitation prescribed in Rev. Stat. § 5057. Mere ignorance of the existence of a cause of action by an assignee in bankruptcy does not remove the bar against such action prescribed by a statute of limitation; but, in order to set aside such bar, within the rule as announced in Bailey v. Glover, 21 Wall. 342, there must be no laches on the part of the assignee in coming to the knowledge of the fraud which is the foundation of the suit.

In the year 1867, the Connecticut Mutual Life Insurance Company issued three policies of insurance upon the life of Matthias Ellis, numbered respectively 68,428, 68,429 and 68,430, the first two being for $10,000 each, and the last for $5000. Each policy was payable to the executors, administrators and assigns of the assured, upon proof of his death.

On the 19th of May, 1877, the assured, in writing, transferred and assigned these policies, and all profits, dividends, non-forfeiture policies, money or other property that might arise from or be paid for or on account of them, to E. Rollins Morse, in trust, to pay the income, profits, or proceeds thereof to his two daughters, Helena and Marie. This assignment was lodged with the insurance company, though it does not clearly appear by whom, nor when, except that it must have been prior to March 1, 1879.

Statement of the Case.

Ellis filed, July 3, 1878, in the District Court of the United States for the District of Kentucky, his petition in bankruptcy, and, having been adjudged a bankrupt, his estate was transferred by the register to Horace W. Bates, who acted as assignee until May, 1882. He was succeeded by the present defendant in error.

The schedules in bankruptcy made no mention of the above policies of insurance.

On the 1st day of March, 1879, policy 68,430 was surrendered to the company for the sum of $1054, which amount was applied in payment as well of the premiums due in that year on policies 68,428 and 68,429 as of future premiums, in cancellation of premium note or credit, and in discharge of the accrued interest on that note. The receipt showing the details of this transaction was signed by Ellis, and by Morse as trustee.

The bankrupt died November 21, 1879, and on the 31st of December in the same year the company paid to his administrator, the plaintiff in error, (he being also the guardian of the children of the assured,) the sum of $9390.43, the proceeds of policy 68,428, and $258.21 the balance of the surrender value of policy 68,430.

The present action was brought September 30, 1882, by the assignee in bankruptcy to recover from Ellis' administrator the sums so received by the latter. It proceeds upon the ground that the policies constituted part of the bankrupt's estate, and passed to his assignee. The declaration alleges that the existence of the policies was concealed and withheld from the assignee, and remained in Ellis' possession and control until his death, when they were taken possession of by the defendant, in his capacity as administrator, except that policy No. 68,430 had been surrendered by Ellis, on or about March 2, 1879; that the assignee in bankruptcy had no knowledge or information concerning the policies until shortly before the commencement of this suit, "the same being concealed by said Ellis in his lifetime, and since his death by his administrator; and that immediately upon being informed of the existence of said property he demanded the same or the proceeds thereof from the defendant."

Argument for Defendant in Error.

The answer puts in issue the material allegations of the declaration, and pleads specially that the cause of action did not accrue to the assignee, nor against the defendant as administrator, within two years before the suing out of the plaintiff's writ.

The court refused to grant any of the defendant's requests for instructions, including one based upon the statute of limitations, and instructed the jury that the plaintiff was entitled to recover the two sums claimed by him, with interest on each from the date of the writ. A verdict was thereupon returned in favor of the plaintiff for the sum of $11,539.56, upon which judgment was rendered.

Mr. Joshua D. Ball (with whom was Mr. Edward Avery on the brief) for plaintiff in error.

Mr. Eugene M. Johnson (with whom was Mr. Nathan Morse on the brief) for defendant in error.

The third error assigned is: "That the court should have ruled that this action was barred by the provisions of § 5057 of the Revised Statutes of the United States (being the limitation of two years contained in the bankrupt law of the United States,) unless the defendant fraudulently concealed from Bates, the first assignee, the alleged cause of action, and that mere omission on the part of the defendant to disclose to Bates, the assignee, the facts, would not amount to a fraudulent concealment." The court was right in refusing to give this ruling.

Section 5057 of the Revised Statutes of the United States provides that no suit at law or in equity shall be maintainable in any court between an assignee in bankruptcy and a person claiming an adverse interest touching any property or rights of property transferable to or vested in such assignee, unless brought within two years from the time when the cause of action accrued for or against said assignee. It has been expressly held that this section has no application to a suit against the bankrupt. Clark v. Clark, 17 How. 315; Phelps v. McDonald, 99 U. S. 298; In re Conant, 5 Blatchford, 54;