Per Curiam.
We granted certiorari in this case to review a judgment of the Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit, 229 F. 2d 232, reversing an order of the District Court for the Southern District of Illinois, sitting in bankruptcy, which required respondent as trustee of a bankrupt’s estate to pay $27,400 to petitioner. 351 U. S. 949. The District Court’s order was based on a finding that, subsequent to the date of the adjudication of bankruptcy, the bankrupt had obtained money by fraud from the petitioner and had turned over $27,400 of that money to respondent. At the hearing before the District Court, petitioner had sought to introduce into evidence an affidavit in which the bankrupt stated that he had paid $36,000 of the money he had received from petitioner to the respondent. At the conclusion of the hearing, the District Court sustained respondent’s motion to strike the affidavit.
On appeal, the Court of Appeals held that petitioner had failed to prove that any specific portion of the money that he had given the bankrupt became a part of the funds in the hands of respondent. Because petitioner had not cross-appealed, the Court of Appeals held that it could not consider the action of the District Court in striking the bankrupt’s affidavit from the record.
A successful party in the District Court may sustain its judgment on any ground that finds support in the record. If the District Court was in error in striking an admissible affidavit, a cross-appeal was not a prerequisite for the Court of Appeals to rule on the admissibility of the affidavit, and finding it admissible, to find that it afforded evidence in support of the District Court judgment. United States v. American Railway Express Co., 265 U. S. 425, 435-436; Langnes v. Green, 282 U. S. 531, 538-539. Since the Court of Appeals did not consider the admissibility and weight of the affidavit, we remand to the Court of Appeals for its consideration of those issues.
The claim in this case is that relevant admissible evidence established a constructive trust. Whether it did so or not is a question of Illinois law. The Court of Appeals, in the view it took of the case before it, did not reach this local question. On remand, that question too must be considered by the Court of Appeals.
Reversed and remanded.
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine whether the decision of the court whose decision the Supreme Court reviewed was itself liberal or conservative. In the context of issues pertaining to criminal procedure, civil rights, First Amendment, due process, privacy, and attorneys, consider liberal to be pro-person accused or convicted of crime, or denied a jury trial, pro-civil liberties or civil rights claimant, especially those exercising less protected civil rights (e.g., homosexuality), pro-child or juvenile, pro-indigent pro-Indian, pro-affirmative action, pro-neutrality in establishment clause cases, pro-female in abortion, pro-underdog, anti-slavery, incorporation of foreign territories anti-government in the context of due process, except for takings clause cases where a pro-government, anti-owner vote is considered liberal except in criminal forfeiture cases or those where the taking is pro-business violation of due process by exercising jurisdiction over nonresident, pro-attorney or governmental official in non-liability cases, pro-accountability and/or anti-corruption in campaign spending pro-privacy vis-a-vis the 1st Amendment where the privacy invaded is that of mental incompetents, pro-disclosure in Freedom of Information Act issues except for employment and student records. In the context of issues pertaining to unions and economic activity, consider liberal to be pro-union except in union antitrust where liberal = pro-competition, pro-government, anti-business anti-employer, pro-competition, pro-injured person, pro-indigent, pro-small business vis-a-vis large business pro-state/anti-business in state tax cases, pro-debtor, pro-bankrupt, pro-Indian, pro-environmental protection, pro-economic underdog pro-consumer, pro-accountability in governmental corruption, pro-original grantee, purchaser, or occupant in state and territorial land claims anti-union member or employee vis-a-vis union, anti-union in union antitrust, anti-union in union or closed shop, pro-trial in arbitration. In the context of issues pertaining to judicial power, consider liberal to be pro-exercise of judicial power, pro-judicial "activism", pro-judicial review of administrative action. In the context of issues pertaining to federalism, consider liberal to be pro-federal power, pro-executive power in executive/congressional disputes, anti-state. In the context of issues pertaining to federal taxation, consider liberal to be pro-United States and conservative pro-taxpayer. In miscellaneous, consider conservative the incorporation of foreign territories and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states or judcial authority vis-a-vis state or federal legislative authority, and consider liberal legislative veto. The lower court's decision direction is unspecifiable if the manner in which the Supreme Court took jurisdiction is original or certification; or if the direction of the Supreme Court's decision is unspecifiable and the main issue pertains to private law or interstate relations