attachment
Definitions from Case Law · United States Supreme Court
Definitions from Case Law
From 312 U.S. 183 - Huron Holding Corporation v. Lincoln Mine Operating Co · 1941Most cited · 359 citing opinions
attachment is wholly the creature of, and controlled by, the law of the state; property and persons within the state can be subjected to the operation of that local law; power over the person who owes a debt confers jurisdiction on the courts of the state where the writ of attachment issues; and by reason of the constitutional requirement that full faith and credit be given the valid actions of a state, courts of one state must recognize valid attachment judgments of other states
How the Supreme Court has restated “attachment”
Each Supreme Court definition of “attachment,” sized by how often later courts cited it. “Change” is measured by wording overlap with earlier definitions — a rough signal, not a semantic judgment.
How often courts cite the cases defining “attachment”
Court decisions citing the 3 opinions that defined “attachment” — 449 in all, by decade. Counts are citations to the defining cases as a whole, not verified uses of the term. The dip in the most recent years is a data-coverage gap, not a real trend — our corpus holds fewer opinions from the latest years.
All 3 definitions, chronological · 1855–1941
- ORIGINAL
The attachment invests in plaintiff with the same right to action which belonged to the Canal Company; and no defence, which could not have been made at law to an action by the company, can be made to the attachment, which is but a substituted mode of pursuing the same right.
rights of attaching creditor
The word 'attachment,' as ordinarily understood in American law, has reference to a writ the object of which is to hold property to abide the order of the court for payment of a judgment in the event the debt shall be established. ... An attachment has but few of the attributes of an execution; the execution contemplated by the statute being the judicial process for obtaining the debt or damages recovered by judgment, and final in its character, while the attachment is but mesne process, liable at any time to be dissolved, and the judgment upon which may or may not affect the property seized.
American legal usage