Robert Cooper Grier

“ If there be another administrator in another State, liable to pay the same debt, he may be subjected to a like judgment upon the same demand, but the assets in his hands cannot be affected by a judgment to which he is personally a stranger. A judgment may have the 'effect' of a lien upon all the defendant's lands in the State where it is rendered, yet it cannot have that effect on lands in another State by virtue of the faith and credit given to it by the Constitution and act of Congress. The laws and courts of a State can only affect persons and things within their jurisdiction. ”

“ But the truth is, the doctrine of personal privity has no application here, and can never be interposed, but as to parties who may be affected in their personal rights. A trustee of a legal title for the heirs cannot object to the judgment against the ancestor as incompetent evidence in suit against him to recover the trust property, on the ground that he is not a privy to the judgment. And so of the administrator, who is but a trustee for the creditors and distributees. ”

“ Privity between one administrator and another does not depend upon, and cannot be created by, their being each of them the representative of the same intestate, though it be a duty in which they all unite. It has not been so regarded in the English law, which, until the 17th Car. 2, did not regard the administrator de bonis non in privity with an executor or administrator, to bring scire facias on the judgment which the executor, or administrator, had obtained. ”

“ What constitutes privity between one representative of a dead man and another representative depends upon no peculiar rules springing out of a practice of the probate court, in regard to the representatives of deceased persons, but is to be ascertained upon principles of the common law, as applicable to cases generally, of which a variety of illustrations will be found in the books, especially 1 Stark. ”

“ There would be no ground for asserting that these representatives in different States constitute one representative, as several executors under the same will, or administrators under the same jurisdiction, may constitute one executor or administrator, though the assets confided to each may be separated. ”

“ The act of Congress of 26th May, 1790, expressly requires that this judgment shall have full faith and credit given to it in every court within the United States, as it has by law or usage in the courts of the State of Mississippi. ”

“ It is alleged by those who desire to elude this conclusion, while they cannot deny the correctness of the principles on which it is founded, that it is technical and theoretical, and leads to an inconvenient result. ”