Houston v. Ormes

48 Citing cases

  1. Ducker v. Butler

    104 F.2d 236 (D.C. Cir. 1939)   Cited 9 times

    In so doing his action may not be controlled by the courts; and equitable relief will not be available to appellants, in any event, until he has performed his duty and determined the amounts to be paid to all interested agents and attorneys under all three of the contracts with the Indians which are set out in the Act. Houston v. Ormes, 252 U.S. 469, 473, 40 S.Ct. 369, 64 L.Ed. 667; Mellon v. Orinoco Iron Co., 266 U.S. 121, 126, 45 S.Ct. 53, 69 L.Ed. 199; Doerschuck v. Mellon, 60 App.D.C. 383, 386, 55 F.2d 741, 744; Morgenthau v. Fidelity Deposit Co., 68 App.D.C. 163, 165, 94 F.2d 632, 634. See Miguel v. McCarl, 291 U.S. 442, 54 S.Ct. 465, 78 L. Ed. 901.

  2. Morgenthau v. Fidelity & Deposit Co.

    94 F.2d 632 (D.C. Cir. 1937)   Cited 30 times
    In Morgenthau v. Fidelity Deposit Co. of Md., 68 App. D.C. 163, 94 F.2d 632, the court said: "* * * R.S. § 3477, as amended, 31 U.S.C.A. § 203, * * * has never been construed to apply to assignments by operation of law.

    The check and the fund represented by the check are not claimed by the United States, and the officials of the government are charged with a ministerial duty to make payment on demand to the person to whom it is properly payable; and from this it follows as a necessary consequence that one who has an equitable right in the fund as against the payee may have relief against the officials of the Treasury through a mandatory writ of injunction or a receivership, so as to bind the payee and afford a proper acquittance to the government. As much as this was said in Houston v. Ormes, 252 U.S. 469, 40 S.Ct. 369, 64 L.Ed. 667. Neither the doctrine announced nor the procedure pursued here is novel.

  3. Z. F. Assets Corp. v. Hull

    311 U.S. 470 (1941)   Cited 30 times

    Cf., Williams v. Heard, 140 U.S. 529; Comegys v. Vasse, 1 Pet. 193. Cf., Houston v. Ormes, 252 U.S. 469; Parish v. MacVeagh, 214 U.S. 124. This Fund consists of 20% of the German property seized during the war, unallocated interest thereon, the specific appropriation by Congress of more than $86,000,000 and the moneys received under the Paris agreement of January 14, 1925 and under the German-American debt agreement of June 23, 1930.

  4. Mellon v. Orinoco Iron Co.

    266 U.S. 121 (1924)   Cited 18 times

    hers, shall be deposited in the Treasury; and that the Secretary of State shall determine the amounts due claimants from such funds and certify the same to the Secretary of the Treasury who, upon presentation of such certificates, shall pay the amounts so found to be due; the act appropriating such funds in the Treasury "for the payment to the ascertained beneficiaries thereof of the certificates herein provided for." Held, that the duty of the Secretary of the Treasury in paying such certificates is ministerial; and that, where the claimant named in a certificate held as trustee exmaleficio for another whose equity the Secretary of State had remitted to the courts, the Supreme Court of the District of Columbia had jurisdiction of a suit brought by such beneficial owner against the other in which the Secretary of the Treasury and the Treasurer of the United States might be impleaded, be required to pay over the money to a receiver, and be enjoined from making other disposition of it. Houston v. Ormes, 252 U.S. 469. P. 125. 54 App.D.C. 218; 296 F. 965, affirmed. APPEAL by the Secretary of the Treasury and the Treasurer of the United States from a decree of the Court of Appeals of the District of Columbia, which affirmed a decree of the Supreme Court of the District directing payment of a fund to a receiver and granting an injunction against other disposition of it.

  5. Clackamas County, Ore. v. McKay

    219 F.2d 479 (D.C. Cir. 1954)   Cited 23 times
    Recounting grant's history

    Appellee Secretaries cite Mine Safety Appliances Co. v. Forrestal. The Supreme Court, in pointing out the basis upon which it held mandamus not available in that case, said: "Certainly the action which the Secretary proposed to take is not a violation of any express command of Congress. Cf. Rolston v. Missouri Fund Comm'rs, 120 U.S. 390, 411 [ 7 S.Ct. 599, 30 L.Ed. 721]; Houston v. Ormes, 252 U.S. 469 [ 40 S.Ct. 369, 64 L.Ed. 667]; Smith v. Jackson, 246 U.S. 388 [ 38 S.Ct. 353, 62 L.Ed. 788]." In Houston v. Ormes the Court had affirmed a decree which established a lien upon funds in the Treasury.

  6. Sarasota Doctors Hosp. v. Sarasota Cnty.

    No. 2D2022-4019 (Fla. Dist. Ct. App. Jul. 31, 2024)

    In other words, when a governmental actor exceeds the authority expressly conferred upon it by law, that entity or person is no longer acting as the sovereign, and as a result, an action premised on grounds that such authority has been exceeded is not deemed an action against the sovereign to which sovereign immunity applies. See Houston v. Ormes, 252 U.S. 469, 472 (1920). "[A] suit brought by the person entitled to the performance of the duty against the official charged with its performance is not a suit against the government."

  7. United States v. Munsey Trust Co.

    332 U.S. 234 (1947)   Cited 352 times
    Holding "laborers and materialmen" did not have enforceable rights against the United States

    Such proceedings to appoint a receiver in the District of Columbia are for the purpose of taking possession of a fund or property and Page 238 to prevent its loss or dissipation. Insolvency is not a necessary allegation, Houston v. Ormes, 252 U.S. 469, and there is no claim in this case that the contractor is insolvent. On demand by the receiver for the amounts due, the General Accounting Office deducted the government's claim of $6,731.50 and paid over $5,713.53.

  8. Mine Safety Co. v. Forrestal

    326 U.S. 371 (1945)   Cited 91 times
    Dismissing an action where the Under Secretary of the Navy was sued in his official capacity, because the Government was a required entity that could not be joined when it withheld consent to be sued

    Nor does the record present any other circumstances that would make the Secretary suable as an individual in this proceeding. Certainly the action which the Secretary proposed to take is not a violation of any express command of Congress. Cf. Rolston v. Missouri Fund Comm'rs, 120 U.S. 390, 411; Houston v. Ormes, 252 U.S. 469; Smith v. Jackson, 246 U.S. 388. The sole purpose of this proceeding is to prevent the Secretary from taking certain action which would stop payment by the government of money lawfully in the United States Treasury to satisfy the government's and not the Secretary's debt to the appellant. The assumption underlying this action is that if the relief prayed for is granted, the government will pay and thus relinquish ownership and possession of the money.

  9. Transamerica Assurance Corp. v. Settlement Capital Corp.

    489 F.3d 256 (6th Cir. 2007)   Cited 15 times
    Holding that a state-court decision ordering the federal government to direct an annuity company to change the annuity payee of the government's annuity violates sovereign immunity

    In the sovereign immunity context, a ministerial action is one that the official has a legal duty to perform, as opposed to one he has discretion to perform or not. See, e.g., id. Settlement Capital identifies no legal duty on the part of the federal government or any federal official to redesignate the payee on the annuity in question, so the ministerial-acts exception is unavailing. See also Houston v. Ormes, 252 U.S. 469, 472, 40 S.Ct. 369, 64 L.Ed. 667 (1920) (deeming federal sovereign immunity inapplicable because "the fund in question has been appropriated by act of Congress for payment to a specified person" and "the officials of the Treasury are charged with the ministerial duty to make payment on demand to the person designated"); Minnesota v. Hitchcock, 185 U.S. 373, 386, 22 S.Ct. 650, 46 L.Ed. 954 (1902) (noting that federal sovereign immunity is not implicated when "officers of the United States are sued, in appropriate form, to compel them to perform some ministerial duty imposed upon them by law, and which they wrongfully neglect or refuse to perform"). V

  10. Simmat v. U.S. Bureau of Prisons

    413 F.3d 1225 (10th Cir. 2005)   Cited 338 times
    Holding APA's waiver of sovereign immunity is not limited to suits under the APA

    Significantly, application of the mandamus remedy to require a public official to perform a duty imposed upon him in his official capacity is not limited by sovereign immunity. In Houston v. Ormes, the Court held that suits to compel federal officers "'to perform some ministerial duty imposed upon them by law, and which they wrongfully neglect or refuse to perform . . . would not be deemed suits against the United States within the rule that the Government cannot be sued except by its consent.'" 252 U.S. 469, 472-73, 40 S.Ct. 369, 64 L.Ed. 667 (1920) (quoting Minnesota v. Hitchcock, 185 U.S. 373, 386, 22 S.Ct. 650, 46 L.Ed. 954 (1902)); see also, e.g., Roberts v. United States ex rel. Valentine, 176 U.S. 221, 20 S.Ct. 376, 44 L.Ed. 443 (1900) (granting mandamus against the United States Treasurer); Washington Legal Foundation v. U.S. Sentencing Comm'n, 89 F.3d 897, 901 (D.C. Cir. 1996).