Page:North Dakota Reports (vol. 1).pdf/332

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308
NORTH DAKOTA REPORTS.

tect the defendant, as the property would remain subject to the attachment in his hands, and he be thereby precluded from selling it in the usual course of business. Under our statute, the substitute bond takes the place of the lien of attachment, and defendant can, by giving it, secure or retain, without losing the right to attack the writ because improvidently issued, the same unfettered dominion over his property which he could exercise before the seizure was made or threatened. It was also argued that a bond given to discharge a void attachment is itself void, and that the attachment in this case being founded, as is admitted by the motion to strike out the affidavits, on a false affidavit, is void. This question will more properly arise in an action on the bond, but as the motion to discharge also embodies the further motion to annul the bond, we will consider the point. The general proposition that avoid attachment will not sustain a bond given to discharge it or release the property is sustained by authority, and is sound on principle. Williams v. Skipwith, 34 Ark. 529; Bruce v. Conyers, 54 Ga. 679; Hamilton v. Merrill, 37 Ohio St. 685; Vose v. Cockroft, 44 N. Y. 415; Shevlin v. Whelen, 41 Wis. 93; Bank v. Mixter, 124 U. S. 728, 8 Sup. Ct. Rep. 718. But the attachment in this case was not void. There was jurisdiction to issue it. The power to grant the warrant rests not upon the fact of non. residence, but upon the fact that the affidavit states that the defendant is a non-resident. The statute provides that “the warrant may issue on affidavit stating,” etc. § 4995 Comp. Laws. Said the court in Haggart v. Morgan, 5 N. Y. 422: “The fact itself is not jurisdictional, although competent proof of that fact is.” And in Lovier v. Gilpin, 6 Dana, 321, the court observed: “The authority of the justice does not depend in any degree upon the truth of the statement made by the affiant, and on the ground of which the attachment issues, but upon the sufficiency of the statement itself when compared with the law. To prove the falsity of a statement which is sufficient in itself does not, therefore, disprove the authority or jurisdiction of the justice, nor prove nor make the process void for want of authority.” See, also, Drake, Attchm. §§ 320, 397, note. The only case appearing to hold the contrary is Egan v. Lumsden, 2 Disn. 168. In the other cases