Maryland Casualty Co. v. Superior Court

This is an original application for a peremptory writ of mandate to dismiss a certain action pending in the said Superior Court wherein S. W. Towle Lumber Company (a domestic corporation), is plaintiff, and G. P. Anderson, Maryland Casualty Company (the petitioner), and others, are defendants. The alternative writ was issued by the Supreme Court and made returnable in this court. The grounds upon which it is claimed the said action should be dismissed arise out of the fact that the plaintiff corporation in that action,-Towle Lumber Company, had suffered the penalties prescribed by law for failure to pay its corporate license and franchise taxes to the state of California. The action is for breach of contract and foreclosure of mechanic’s lien. The petitioner had executed, pursuant to the Mechanic’s Lien Law, a bond to secure the payment of mechanics’ liens and for that reason was a defendant in said action.

■The facts made to appear to us on this hearing are that at the time of the execution of the contract under which the mechanic’s lien arose, and also at the time the said action was instituted, the said Towle Lumber Company had not paid its license tax and franchise tax; but…