William Henry Moody

“ Where the multiplicity of suits to be feared consists in repetitions of suits by the same person against the plaintiff for causes of action arising out of the same facts and legal principles, a court of equity ought not to interfere upon that ground unless it is clearly necessary to protect the plaintiff from continued and vexatious litigation. Something more is required than the beginning of a single action with an honest purpose to settle the rights of the parties. ”

“ The city's only remedy is that which it has employed,-an action at law for the collection of the license fee. The plaintiff's real point here is not that the ordinance imposing a license fee casts a cloud upon its title, but that the reason alleged to have induced the ordinance, namely, the city's claim that the company has no more than a mere permission to occupy the streets, unfavorably affects its property and impairs its credit. ”

“ That question is whether the plaintiff is entitled, on the allegations of its bill, to relief in equity in the Federal courts.
It is obvious that the rights of which the company seeks to avail itself are rights cognizable in a court of law, and not rights created only by the principles of equity. The sum of the company's contentions is that the imposition of the license fee was illegal, unconstitutional, and void. All these contentions are open in a court of law. ”