#11104 - Full Faith And Credit To Judgments - Conflict of Laws

Full Faith and Credit to Judgments

1. In General

   1. Article IV, § 1

      1. "The Full Faith and Credit shall be given in each State to the public Acts, Records, and Judicial Proceedings of every other State. And the Congress may by general Laws prescribe the Manner in which such Acts, Records and Proceedings shall be proved, and the Effect thereof." (pg. 476)

   2. 28 U.S.C. § 1738

      1. "The records and judicial proceedings of any court of any . . . State, Territory or Possession [of the United States] . . . , or copies thereof, so authenticated, shall have the same full faith and credit in every court within the United States and its Territories and Possessions as they have by law or usage in the courts of such State, Territory or Possession from which they are taken." (pg. 476)

   3. Other Principles

      1. (1) Recognition of a judgment is different than enforcement of a judgment.

         • A state can recognize a judgment without enforcing it

      2. (2) Recognition of a judgment does not necessarily lead to the same effect of a judgment in State B as in State A

      3. (3) Execution (Process)

         • Only State A

           • (1) Get a judgment

           • (2) Go to clerk and get a writ of execution

           • (3) Go to marshall, give writ, get property, and turn to cash to satisfy judgment

         • Multi-State

           • (1) Get judgment is State A

           • (2) "Domesticate" is State B via new lawsuit in State B

           • (3) Go to clerk and get a writ of execution

           • (4) Go to marshall, give writ, get property, and turn to cash to satisfy judgment

2. Final Decrees of Sister States

   1. Fauntleroy v. Lum (pg. 477)

      1. "[T]he judgment of a state court should have the same credit, validity, and effect in every other court in the United States, which it had in the State where it was pronounced, and that whatever pleas would be good to a suit thereon in such State, and none others, could be pleaded in any other court in the United States." (pg. 479)

      2. "A judgment is conclusive as to all media concludendi, . . . and it need no authority to show that it cannot be impeached either in or out of the State by showing that it was based upon a mistake of law. Of course a want of jurisdiction over either the person or the subject-matter might be shown." (pp. 479-80)

         • "[A] judgment is entitled to full faith and credit - even as to questions of jurisdiction - when the second court's inquiry discloses that those questions have been fully and fairly litigated and finally decided in the court in which rendered the original judgment." Durfee v. Duke (pg. 504)

   2. Second Restatement § 103 cmt. b:

      1. "There will be extremely rare occasions . . . when recognition of a sister State judgment would require too large a sacrifice by a State of its interest in a matter with which it is primarily concerned. On these extremely rare occasions, the policy embodied in full faith and credit will give way before the national policy that requires protection of the dignity and of the fundamental interests of each individual State. So, full faith and credit does not require a State to recognize a sister State injunction against suit in its courts on the ground that it is an inconvenient forum. . . . Likewise, it may be that full faith and credit is not owed a sister State custody decree on the ground that a court should be free to disregard such a decree when this is required by the best interests of the child." (pg. 487)

   3. Yarborough v. Yarborough (pg. 481)

      1. "[T]he full faith and credit clause applies to an unalterable decree of alimony for a divorce wife." (pg. 483)

      2. "The clause applies, likewise to an unalterable decree of alimony for a minor child." (pg. 483)

   4. Thomas v. Washington Gas Light Co. (pg. 493)

      1. "[A] State has no legitimate interest within the context of our federal system in preventing another State from granting a supplemental compensation award when that second State would have the power to apply its workmen's compensation law in the first instance. The Full Faith and Credit Clause should not be construed to preclude successive workmen's compensation awards." (pg. 499)

         • This seems to be a limited exception to full faith and credit to judgments, based upon the interest or public policy of the state in which the judgment is sought to be enforced. BUT the exception, if this indeed is an exception, is limited to worker compensation awards.

      2. NOTWITHSTANDING Thomas, administrative awards and orders today are treated the same as judgments if the agency is empowered to adjudicate, its procedures comply with the essential elements of adjudication, and its actions are conclusive where made. See Restatement (Second) Judgments § 83(i) (pg. 502)

   5. Dean Witter Reynolds, Inc. v. Byrd (pg. 502)

      1. Neither full faith and credit nor a judicially-fashioned rule of preclusion required that preclusive effect be given to unappealed arbitration proceedings, because an arbitration without court review was not a judicial proceeding.

   6. The case law suggests that Court 2 could give a judgment greater effect than Court 1. See Hart v. American Airlines, Inc. (pg. 488)

   7. Personal Jurisdiction

      1. Remember, if you make a special appearance to contest personal jurisdiction, then the issue will have been fully and fairly litigated such that the judgment must be afforded full faith and credit in another court.

         • HOWEVER, if you make no appearance at all, then you can collaterally attack the judgment for want of personal jurisdiction.

   8. Subject Matter Jurisdiction

      1. Obviously, if you have fully litigated the issue of subject-matter jurisdiction, then there judgment cannot be collaterally attacked. See Durfee v. Duke

      2. What happens if it was not actually litigated?

         • Chicot County Drainage Dist. v. Baxter State Bank (pg. 508) held that explicit litigation of the jurisdictional issue is unnecessary. The judgment in that case was held to have preclusive effect notwithstanding the fact that the issue had not been raised or litigated in the first case.

         • In Sherrer v. Sherrer (pg. 508), subject-matter jurisdiction was held foreclosed even though the defendant's opposition to jurisdiction in the first case was tepid at best.

         • In Coe v. Coe (pg. 508), subject-matter jurisdiction was held foreclosed where the issue had been conceded in the first matter.

         • It seems likely that there would still be preclusive effect even where it is a default judgment. See Chicot County Drainage Dist. v. Baxter State Bank

   9. Second Restatement § 15 (pg. 510)

      1. Inconsistent Judgments. When in two actions inconsistent final judgments are rendered, it is the later, not the earlier, judgment that is accorded conclusive effect in a third action under the rules of res judicata.

3. Land Taboo

   1. Persistent exception to Full Faith and Credit but there is a work around in the case law.

   2. Only the state in which the real property is situated has subject-matter jurisdiction in a matter involving the disposition of that real property. See Clarke v. Clarke

      1. "It is a doctrine firmly established that the law of a State in which land is situated controls and governs its transmission by will or its passage in case of intestacy." (pg. 511)

      2. "[W]here the suit is strictly local, the subject matter is specific property, and the relief when granted is such that is must act directly upon the subject-matter, and not upon the person of the defendant, the jurisdiction must be exercised in the State where the subject-matter is situated." Fall v. Eastin (pg. 515)

   3. BUT Fall v. Eastin (pg. 512)

      1. "The territorial limitation of the jurisdiction of courts of a State over property in another State has a limited exception in the jurisdiction of a court of equity. . . ."

         • "A court of equity having authority to act upon the person may indirectly act upon real estate in another State, through the instrumentality of this authority over the person." (pg. 514)

         • "[W]hen the subject-matter of a suit in a court of equity is within another State or country, but the parties within the jurisdiction of the court, the suit may be maintained and remedies granted which may directly affect and operate upon the person of the defendant and not upon the subject-matter, although the subject-matter is referred to in the decree, and the defendant is ordered to do or refrain from certain acts towards it, and it is thus ultimately but indirectly affected by the relief granted. (pg. 514)

         • "In such a case the decree is not of itself legal title, nor does it transfer the legal title. It must be executed by the party, and obedience is compelled by proceedings in the nature of contempt, attaching, or sequestration." (pg. 514)

   4. Second Restatement § 87 cmt. a would permit actions for harm done to land:

      1. "Such an action does not seek to affect title to foreign land, as would a bill to quiet title, nor does it require official action in the state where the plaintiff asks that the defendant be removed from the land and he himself placed in possession."

   5. The Land Taboo is merely a trap for the unwary. It is all about pleading the suit such that it does not purport to directly affect the title to land but rather acts upon the person even if it indirectly affects the land.

4. Non-Final Decrees

   1. Lack of Finality

      1. A judgment lacks finality if further judicial action by the court rendering the judgment is required to resolve the matter litigated.

      2. To the extent that issues remain subject to final determination, they are not res judicata either in the state of rendition or elsewhere.

      3. The local law of the rendering state determines whether a judgment is "final."

      4. In Paine v. Schenectady Ins. Co., there were two judgments: (1) a Rhode Island judgment that reached judgment first but was...