Leo Mantin v. Broadcast Music, Inc., a Corporation

In the United States District Court for the Southern District of California, Leo Mantin, hereafter called plaintiff, brought a civil action against 34 defendants. None of the defendants answered. Six of the defendants moved to dismiss the action. None of the other defendants appeared. The District Court granted the motion and entered a judgment dismissing the action. Plaintiff appealed from the judgment.

As heretofore held by us, we have jurisdiction of the appeal.

This was a diversity action — an action invoking the District Court’s jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C.A. § 1332 . After hearing argument on the appeal, we discovered that the complaint alleged, in substance, that each of the defendants was a citizen or corporation of a State other than California or was a foreign corporation, and that plaintiff was a resident of California, but did not allege that plaintiff was a citizen of California. We pointed this out on May 3, 1957. Thereafter, pursuant to 28 U.S.C.A. § 1653 , the jurisdictional allegations of the complaint were amended in this court so that they now include an allegation that plaintiff was and is a citizen of California. We accordingly hold that the District Court…