take effect upon ratification by a majority | script in this court. The following is an of the legal voters of the Nation. It was thus ratified on August 7, 1902. outline of the facts found: Mrs. Martin was the granddaughter of an Indian woman known as Mary Anderson, or Anson, afterwards Mary Thursday, and was the daughter of William Bob Anson, otherwise known as Wild Bill. She had a brother known as Sam Bob. All these parties were Delaware Indians, adopted into the Cherokee Tribe, and as such were entitled to certain Delaware payments from the government. During Mrs. Martin's childhood, she and her brother and their parents resided with the grandmother, who was the head of the family, upon an improved tract of land known as the "old home place," located south and west of the land in controversy. Wild Bill died in 1889, and his wife about the same time; and, after this, such pay On May 13, 1904, Harnage made application to the Dawes Commission to have the land in controversy allotted to him, and his application was granted. Thirteen days later Mrs. Martin made a similar application, and this was refused on the ground of the prior allotment to Harnage; thereupon she instituted a contest before the commission against the Harnage allotment. It came to trial before the Dawes Commissioner in September, 1907, and resulted in a decision in favor of Mrs. Martin. Harnage appealed to the Commissioner of Indian Affairs, who rendered a like decision, and this, on appeal to the Secretary of the Interior, was affirmed; and deeds for the land in contest were made to Mrs. Martin_pur-ments as were due to Wild Bill as a Delasuant to the act. Upon the trial of the equity case plaintiffs in error introduced a certified transcript of all proceedings and evidence in the contest proceeding, and this was the only evidence offered that was at all pertinent to the question we have to decide. Defendants in error demurred to the evidence, and the demurrer was sustained and the bill of complaint dismissed. This judgment was affirmed by the supreme court of Oklahoma (40 Okla. 341, 136 Pac. 154). Harnage having admittedly filed first upon the land in controversy, Mrs. Martin was entitled to prevail in the contest only by showing that at the time of the Harnage filing she was the owner of the improvements, within the meaning of § 11 of the Agreement, and for that reason entitled, under the provisions of the same section, to take this particular land for her allotment. It was found by the Commissioner to the Five Civilized Tribes who heard the contest, and by the Commissioner of Indian Affairs and the Secretary of the Interior who heard the successive appeals, that Mrs. Martin was the owner of the improvements; and the only question for our determination is whether this decision was without evi dence to support it, or was otherwise the result of some error of law on the part of those officers. Ross v. Stewart, 227 U. S. 530, 535, 57 L. ed. 626, 629, 33 Sup. Ct. Rep. 345; Ross v. Day, 232 U. S. 110, 117, 58 L. ed. 528, 530, 34 Sup. Ct. Rep. 233; Johnson v. Riddle, 240 U. S. 467, 474, 60 L. ed. 752, 756, 36 Sup. Ct. Rep. 393. Each of the departmental decisions was made in writing, but the findings are somewhat informal, each appeal having resulted in adding something to what had been found before, a fact not surprising, since the testimony is very voluminous, occupying more than 500 pages of the printed tran ware were paid to Mary Thursday, and also certain small payments that were due to the contestant. About the year 1891, contestant, then a child of about ten years, was removed by force or undue influence to the home of a Delaware named Frenchman, and kept there until the Delaware payments of 1891 and 1893, averaging over $500 each, were paid to the members of the tribe. The payments due to contestant were collected by Frenchman, who appropriated them to his own use, this having been his object in assuming control over the child. Later she was sent away to school at the expense of the government, and afterwards returned to the vicinity of her home, where she supported herself by her labor. In November, 1898, when she was about eighteen years of age, she was married to George Martin, and shortly after this she and her husband visited Mary Thursday, and the latter then ascertained that contestant had not secured any land for future allotment. (This was after the establishment of the Dawes Commission, and after the passage of the Curtis Act of June 28, 1898 [chap. 517, § 11, 30 Stat. at L. 495-497], when the allotment of the Indian lands in the then territory was in contemplation; Woodward v. De Graffenried, 238 U. S. 284, 291, 59 L. ed. 1310, 1317, 35 Sup. Ct. Rep. 764.) During contestant's absence the original home place had been added to by the purchase in 1893 of the improvements on about 90 acres of land lying immediately north of it for $800, the purchase price having been paid by Mary Thursday and Sam Bob from the proceeds of the Delaware payments, and the bill of sale for the improvements having been made to them. The entire place then comprised about 200 acres of improvements. Mrs. Thursday, recognizing an indebtedness to contestant on account of having received Delaware payments due to her and to her father, and there being sufficient land for herself and Sam Bob and ] The evidence is to some extent circumcontestant, gave to contestant a right to stantial, but it is sufficient. It was contraselect the land in controversy, or at least to dicted by Wallace Thursday, the husband take as an allotment some portion of the of Mary, but his unreliability was clearly home place, with the understanding that shown. she, Mary Thursday, would hold it until the time for allotment, which was done. From the time of the making of this arrangement Mrs. Martin was recognized by her grandmother and her brother as having an interest in the place; that is, a right to share in the improvements to the extent necessary to entitle her to an allotment out of the land, notwithstanding her involuntary absence from home during her childhood. It was contended that Mary Thursday, at the time of the transaction referred to, was of unsound mind, but this was overruled as unsupported by the evidence. It appears that before Mrs. Martin filed her allotment selection Mrs. Thursday had located her own allotment in the southern part of the home place, and Sam Bob had located his in the northern part, and the land lying between these was left for Mrs. Martin. This, in view of the previous agreement of Mrs. Thursday, was found to be equivalent to a transfer to Mrs. Martin of the specific improvements upon the intervening tract. The Department found that after the northern and southern portions of the farm were merged into one place there was a recognized community of interest among the members of the family growing out of their relationship and the commingling of their funds, whereby Mrs. Martin had an interest in every part of the family holdings, and that when Sam Bob elected to take his allotment in the northern part of the place and Mary Thursday to take hers in the southern part they impliedly relinquished to the contestant as the remaining member of the family their interest in the tract of land lying between. An agreement that Mrs. Martin should have a part of the Thursday place for her allotment might fairly be held to be equivalent to giving her a sufficient interest in the improvements to support a preferential right to the allotment, for, by Cherokee law, ownership of improvements entitled the owner to possession of the land; and in § 11 of the Curtis Act there was a proviso "that whenever it shall appear that any member of a Tribe is in possession of lands, his allotment may be made out of the lands in his possession, including his home, if the holder so desires." The same general policy was afterwards carried into § 11 of the Cherokee Agreement, with more particular recognition of ownership of the improvements as the decisive point. The contention that the findings were unsupported by evidence cannot be sustained. It is argued that, under § 18 of the Agreement, Mrs. Thursday's possession, after November 5 of that year (ninety days after date of ratification), of all lands in excess of the value of 110 acres of average allottable lands for herself and a like amount for each of her minor children, if any, was unlawful, and that because Mrs. Martin reached the age of twenty-one before the ratification of the Agreement, Mrs. Thursday could not lawfully hold for her any part of the surplus lands. This is based upon a clear misinterpretation of § 18, the very terms of which permitted Mrs. Martin, as a member of the Cherokee Tribe, to hold possession, by herself or "through another," of lands not exceeding in value 110 acres of average allottable lands, and thus authorized her to hold the lands by her grandmother as her agent. There is no question that the improvements upon the allotment in question, as well as upon the adjoining lands, were substantial in value, and were such as, under the tribal law, carried a right of occupancy, and such as were recognized in § 11 of the Curtis Act and § 11 of the Agreement. There is nothing inconsistent with the policy of the latter act in giving to Mrs. Martin, as owner of a substantial equitable interest in the improvements that were upon the tract in question when the act was passed, a preferential right to select that as her allotment. The policy was to give recognition to the established laws and customs of the Cherokees (Const. art. I., § 2; Laws 1892, §§ 706, 761, 762), under which citizens of the Nation might and did inclose and improve portions of their common domain and thereby establish a prior right to the possession of those lands, transferable to another citizen by a sale of the improvements. The Agreement substituted a system of allotments with ownership of the soil in the place of a mere possessory right, and its provisions were intended to limit the quantity of land that might be held by or for a single citizen, but they recognized the superior equity of an owner of improvements over that of a citizen who had no such ownership, and the precise character of the ownership was of little consequence as against a party having none at all. Among the records that were introduced in evidence in the equity suit was an application made in the year 1905 to the Commissioner to the Five Civilized Tribes by Wallace Thursday, acting as guardian of the person and estate of Sam Bob, a minor tate and the distribution of his personal estate situate within that state. Affirmed. See same case below, 162 Ky. 683, L.R.A. 1917C, 171, 173 S. W. 109. The facts are stated in the opinion. Messrs. John A. Pitts and E. W. Ross for plaintiff in error. and of Mary Thursday, an insane person, for, state, determining the domicil of an intesthe sale of the improvements upon the allotment in controversy as surplus holdings of those Indians, and certain orders made in the same year by the United States court for the northern district of the Indian Territory upon the application of Wallace Thursday, authorizing him in the same capacity to sell the improvements to Harnage. But as Mrs. Martin was not a party to these proceedings, and they were taken long after the filing of her application for allotment, they can have no effect as against her. V. BAKER, ECCLES, & COMPANY and Augusta H. Baker, Individually and as Administratrix of Charles Baker, Deceased. - CONSTITUTIONAL LAW 309(1) JUDG- Messrs. Charles K. Wheeler, Daniel Henry Hughes, and James Guthrie Wheeler for defendants in error. Mr. Justice Pitney delivered the opinion of the court: The Federal question presented in this record is whether the court of appeals of Kentucky gave such faith and credit to certain judicial proceedings of the state of Tennessee as were required by art. 4, § 1, of the Constitution, and the act of Congress passed in pursuance thereof (Act of May 26, 1790, chap. 11, 1 Stat. at L. 122, Rev. Stat. § 905, Comp. Stat. 1913, § 1519). He The facts are as follows: Charles Baker died in September, 1912, the owner of certain real and personal property in Hardin county, Tennessee, and of 270 shares of stock of Baker, Eccles, & Company, a Kentucky corporation, of the par value of $27,000, and a claim of several thousand dollars against that corporation for surplus profits. The asserted right of the mother of He left a widow, Josie C. Baker, now plainan intestate to share as distributee in the tiff in error, and a mother, Augusta H. personal property situate in the state of Baker, one of the defendants in error. the mother's residence, such as shares of stock in a corporation of that state, having appears to have left no children or deno situs outside of its own state, and a scendants, nor any considerable indebtedclaim of indebtedness against the same cor-ness, and the personal estate, if distributporation, cannot, consistently with due process of law, be adjudicated adversely by decrees of courts of another state, adjudging that the decedent was domiciled there and that his widow was the sole distributee, where those courts acquired no jurisdiction over the person of the mother or over the corporation, either by service of process within the state or by appearance, and such decrees are, therefore, not entitled, by virtue of the full faith and credit provisions of U. S. Const. art. 4, § 1, and U. S. Rev. Stat. § 905,1 to extraterritorial recognition so far as they affect the ownership of the property in question. [Ed. Note. For other cases, see Constitutional Law, Cent. Dig. §§ 929, 930; Dec. Dig. 309(1): Judgment, Cent. Dig. §§ 1460-1465; Dec. Dig. 818(2).] [No. 115.] able according to the laws of Tennessee, would go entirely to the widow; if distributable according to the laws of Kentucky, it would go one half to the widow, the other half to the mother. The place of his domicil, admittedly determinative of the law of distribution, was in controversy. Shortly after his death the widow applied to the county court of Hardin county, Tennessee, for letters of administration. The proceedings were ex parte, and her application was granted, the order of the court appointing her administratrix reciting that at the time of his death the residence of Charles Baker was in that county. Afterwards, and in December, 1912, the widow presented to the same court a settlement of her accounts as administratrix, and an order was made reciting that it appeared from Argued December 19, 1916. Decided Janu- proof that Charles Baker died intestate, IN ary 8, 1917. N ERROR to the Court of Appeals of the State of Kentucky to review a judgment which directed the entry of a judgment in the Circuit Court of McCracken County, in that and at the time of his death was a resident of Hardin county, Tennessee, and that he left no children or descendants of such surviving, but left surviving his widow, the said Josie C. Baker, and under the laws of Tennessee she, as widow, was entitled to For other cases see same topic & KEY-NUMBER in all Key-Numbered Digests & Indexes 1 Comp. St. 1913, § 1519. all of the surplus personal property; where- | ters of administration to Mrs. Augusta H. upon it was ordered that she, as adminis- Baker, the mother, and she, as such adtratrix, transfer and deliver to herself, as ministratrix, filed a petition in the Mcthe widow of the deceased, all of the per- Cracken circuit court for a settlement of sonal estate in her possession, including the the estate, making the widow and Baker, stock in the Kentucky corporation, the Eccles, & Company defendants. The widow certificates for which she held. Subsequent- did not appear, and a judgment was renly, and on December 28, 1912, the widow, dered that Charles Baker died a resident of individually and as administratrix, filed in McCracken county, Kentucky, and that, unthe chancery court of Hardin county, Ten- der the law of that state, the mother and nessee, her bill of complaint against Mrs. the widow were each entitled to one half of Augusta H. Baker, the mother, as a non- the surplus of the personal estate. The resident of Tennessee and a resident of the corporation was directed to cancel the 270 state of Kentucky, and also against several shares of stock issued to decedent, and repersons who were residents of Tennessee, issue one half of these to the widow, the setting up her appointment as administra- other half to the mother. This judgment trix, averring that her husband died intes- has only historical importance, since the tate, a resident of and domiciled in Kentucky court of appeals in the present Tennessee, leaving his widow as his sole case held it invalid as against the widow heir and distributee, and his mother and a because of failure to comply with the local brother his only heirs at law. The bill law respecting notice to her. further set up the widow's ownership of the stock in Baker, Eccles, & Company, and averred that the mother was asserting an interest in one half of the personal estate left by the intestate, upon the theory that he died a resident of Kentucky and that, under the laws of that state, the mother was entitled to one-half of his surplus personal estate. The prayer was (inter alia) that the mother be brought before the court in the manner provided for nonresidents and be required to assert whatever claim she might have to the estate left by the deceased; and that it might be adjudged that Charles Baker died a resident of Tennessee, and that complainant, as his widow, was the sole distributee and entitled to all of his personal estate. Upon the filing of the bill an order of publication was made, citing Augusta H. Baker as a nonresident to make defense upon a day named, and, she having failed to appear, the bill was taken for confessed against her, and eventually a decree was made "that the said Charles Baker at the time of his death was a citizen of and had his domicil at Savannah, Tennessee, and that the complainant, as his widow, is his sole distributee, and as such entitled to all of the personal estate of the said Charles Baker, after payment of such debts as were owed by him at the time of his death," and also that the title to the stock of Baker, Eccles, & Company was in complainant, and that she was entitled to have a new certificate or certificates in her own name issued by the corporation in lieu of the certificates issued to said Charles Baker, and was entitled to receive from the corporation the amount of the accumulated profits and surplus and other amounts due from it to the decedent. In June, 1913, the widow, individually and as administratrix of Charles Baker, began a suit in equity in the McCracken county circuit court, which resulted in the judgment now under review. Baker, Eccles, & Company was made defendant. The widow's petition, after setting up the orders and judgments of the Tennessee courts and alleging her sole ownership of the personal estate of the deceased by virtue thereof, prayed that the corporation be required to transfer to her individually the 270 shares of stock adjudged to her by the Tennessee chancery decree, and also prayed judgment for $11,429.17, the alleged indebtedness due from the corporation to her husband at the time of his death. Baker, Eccles, & Company filed an answer putting in issue all the averments of the petition. Mrs. Augusta H. Baker, the mother, camo into the suit by an intervening petition, in which she averred that Charles Baker died a resident of the state of Kentucky, and that, under the laws of that state, she was entitled to one half of the shares of stock and of the debt sued for, invoking the McCracken circuit court judgment as an adjudication to that effect. She further put in issue the validity of the orders and judg ments in both the Tennessee courts, averring that so far as they determined that Charles Baker died a resident of that state, and that his widow was entitled to the whole of his personalty after payment of his debts, they were void, because neither of the Tennessee courts had jurisdiction to make such orders or judgments. The pleadings having been made up, evidence was taken on the issue of fact as to the domicil of Charles Baker at the time of his death. Upon this evidence, the records of the juMeanwhile, the county court of Mc- dicial proceedings above mentioned, and a Cracken county, Kentucky, had granted let-showing of the pertinent Tennessee law, the deceased owner. Wilkins v. Ellett, 9 Wall. 740, 19 L. ed. 586, 108 U. S. 256, 27 L. ed. 718, 2 Sup. Ct. Rep. 641. Conceding that such is the general rule of law, it is so not because of any provision of the Federal Constitution, but only because the several states, or most of them, have adopted it from the common law into their respective systems. And the question remains, How is the fact of decedent's domicil to be judicially ascertained as a step in determining what law is to govern the distribution? Obviously, if fundamental principles of justice are to be observed, the ascertainment must be according to due process of law; that is, either by a proceeding in rem in a court having control of the estate, or by a proceeding in personam after service of process upon the parties to be affected by the judgment. case was submitted for hearing, and it was adjudged that the widow's petition be dismissed. The widow appealed to the Kentucky court of appeals, and that court, having determined the judgment of the McCracken circuit court in the mother's administration suit to be invalid as against the widow, held that the judgments of both Tennessee courts were invalid as against the mother because entered without process of law as against her; and then, passing upon the question of fact as to the domicil of Charles Baker, found upon the evidence that he was domiciled in the state of Kentucky and his personalty was distributable according to the laws of that state, and affirmed the judgment, with a modification directing the lower court to enter a judgment that Charles Baker died a resident of Kentucky, that his mother and his widow were each entitled to one half of his personal estate We have no concern with the effect of the situate in Kentucky at the time of his Tennessee judgments upon the distribution death, after the payment of his debts, that of so much of decedent's personalty as was Baker, Eccles, & Company should cancel all situate within that state. The present certificates of stock issued to Charles Baker, action affects only the ownership of shares and reissue one half of these to the widow of stock in a Kentucky corporation having and the other half to the mother, and that no situs outside of its own state, so far the lower court embody in the judgment as appears, and a claim of indebtedness such other matters as would, after the pay-against the same corporation. For the purment of debts, distribute equally between the widow and the mother all other personal estate situate in Kentucky of which Charles Baker died possessed. 162 Ky. 683, L.R.A. 1917C, 171, 173 S. W. 109. To review this judgment upon the Federal question, the widow brings the case here upon writ of error. No question is made by defendants in error but that the Tennessee courts had general jurisdiction over the subject matter, nor that the proceedings were in conformity with the Tennessee statutes respecting practice. The sole question is whether they were entitled, under the Constitution of the United States and the act of Congress, to recognition in the courts of Kentucky as adjudicating adversely the mother's asserted right to share as distributee in the personal property situate in Kentucky, or as conclusively determining the fact of the domicil of the decedent as affecting that right, in view of the failure of the Tennessee courts to acquire jurisdiction over her person or over the corporation, Baker, Eccles, & Company. pose of founding administration, it is commonly held that simple contract debts are assets at the domicil of the debtor, even where a bill of exchange or promissory note has been given as evidence. Wyman v. Halstead (Wyman v. United States) 109 U. S. 654, 656, 27 L. ed. 1068, 1069, 3 Sup. Ct. Rep. 417. The state of the debtor's domicil may impose a succession tax. Blackstone v. Miller, 188 U. S. 189, 205, 47 L. ed. 439, 444, 23 Sup. Ct. Rep. 277. It is equally clear that the state which has created a corporation has such control over the transfer of its shares of stock that it may administer upon the shares of a deceased owner and tax the succession. See Re Bronson, 150 N. Y. 1, 9, 34 L.R.A. 238, 55 Am. St. Rep. 632, 44 N. E. 707; Re Fitch, 160 N. Y. 87, 90, 54 N. E. 701; Greves v. Shaw, 173 Mass. 205, 208, 53 N. E. 372; Kingsbury v. Chapin, 196 Mass. 533, 535, 82 N. E. 700, 13 Ann. Cas. 738; Dixon v. Russell, 79 N. J. L. 490, 492, 76 Atl. 982; Hopper v. Edwards, 88 N. J. L. 471, 96 Atl. 667; People v. Griffith, 245 Ill. 532, 92 N. E. 313. The rule generally adoptIt is the fundamental contention of ed throughout the states is that an adplaintiff in error that the personal estate ministrator appointed in one state has no of an intestate decedent is a legal unit, power virtute officii over property in anhaving its situs at the owner's domicil; other. No state need allow property of a that the title to the whole of it, wherever decedent to be taken without its borders situate, is vested in the duly qualified until debts due to its own citizens have domiciliary administrator, and not in the been satisfied; and there is nothing in the distributees, and that its distribution is Constitution of the United States aside governed by the law of the domicil of the' from the full faith and credit clause to |