BROWN v. WALLACE.—2 BLAIfD. 571

Soon after I came here I was made sensible of the necessity of
great care and vigilance in order to steer clear of any collision

* with my co-ordinate neighbors, and yet have not been able
to do so upon all occasions; because of the facts of the case 601
not having been fully disclosed in the first instance. In a case
where the plaintiff merely represented that he had become the
debtor of the defendant by bond, on which judgment had been
obtained at law, without giving him all the credits to which he
was equitably entitled; I granted an injunction to stay the pro-
ceedings at law. But on its being clearly shewn by the answer,
that the plaintiff at law was suing there on a bond he had taken
as a trustee under a decree of the County Court of equity, I not
only dissolved the injunction, but dismissed the bill witli costs,
on the ground that the proceedings upon the bond were properly
a branch of a suit depending in another Court of equity with whose
movements this Court ought not to intermeddle. But on another
occasion, when I had passed a decree for the payment of a sum of
money, and the party had sued oat a fieri facias, a County Court
granted an injunction to stop the further proceedings upon that
fieri facias. In that case the collision was palpable and direct.
I determined, however, to submit, and without pressing the con-
flict, which could have been attended with no good effect, to leave
the error to be corrected by the County Court itself.

The recollection of these circumstances, has suggested the pro-
priety of explaining my views upon this subject more fully than
might otherwise have been deemed necessary.

It has been thought by some, that where any one Court of com-
petent authority, had in any manner expressed an opinion on a
subject, every other Court having no more than a concurrent juris-
diction, was thereby precluded from taking cognizance of the
same matter. But it is believed, that tue general rule is not so
entirely comprehensive.

It is certain, that a judgment or decree upon any matter put in
issue between the same parties, in relation to the same subject, is
a complete bar to any subsequent suit for the same matter. So
too, after a suit has been instituted, and is then depending in any
Court of competent jurisdiction in this State, though it is not so
with regard to a suit in a foreign Court, no other suit can be main-
tained for the same subject between the same parties. Bourne v.
Joy, 9 John. Rep. 221; Walsh v. Durkin, 12 John. Rep. 99. And
even if the one suit be brought in a Court of common law, and the
other in equity, to prevent such duplicate vexation, the Court

* of Chancery will put the plaintiff to his election, and corn-
pel him to abandon the one suit or the other. 1 Newl. Pra. 602
Cha. 246.

These rules can only apply where the parties and the subject
are the same in both suits: but if there be any essential differ-