Wisconsin Ex Rel. Bolens v. Frear

Background

Harry W. Bolens, a private citizen, asked the Wisconsin Supreme Court to stop enforcement of a state law creating a “progressive income taxation” system (Chapter 658, Laws of Wisconsin for 1911). The State’s Attorney General refused to bring the suit, so Bolens sought the court’s permission to file the action in the name of the State. The Wisconsin Supreme Court allowed the petition to be filed, overruled a demurrer to its original jurisdiction, but on demurrer to the merits held the petition stated no ground for relief and dismissed the case. Bolens then brought a writ of error to the United States Supreme Court, and the Attorney General, by direction of the Governor, moved to dismiss there on the ground that the State was the real party in interest.

Reasoning

The central question was whether this Court could review the state-court judgment when the suit below was treated as an original action for the State and the private relator acted only as the State’s agent. The Court accepted the Wisconsin Supreme Court’s view that in original proceedings the State is the sole plaintiff and a private relator is merely an incident. Because Bolens had no authority to prosecute the suit or to implead the State here without the State’s consent, the United States Supreme Court held it lacked jurisdiction to review the judgment. The Court distinguished ordinary individual lawsuits and noted that a different procedural route might permit federal review, but not in this posture.

Real world impact

The decision is procedural: it dismisses federal review of the Wisconsin ruling and does not decide the tax law’s constitutionality on the merits. It prevents converting a state original action brought for public interests into a federal appeal when the State is the real party and has not consented to be impleaded.