Blatchford v. Newberry

100 Ill. 484
CourtIllinois Supreme Court
DecidedJune 15, 1881
StatusPublished
Cited by20 cases

This text of 100 Ill. 484 (Blatchford v. Newberry) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Illinois Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Blatchford v. Newberry, 100 Ill. 484 (Ill. 1881).

Opinion

Per Curiam:

A judgment was rendered in the present cause, reversing the judgment below, in vacation after the January term, 1878. Petition for rehearing was subsequently filed, and a rehearing was ordered; and the cause was thereupon re-argued at the January term, 1880.. Upon full consideration, it was then again adjudged that the judgment below be reversed, and the judgment of the court was so entered of record on the 2d day of February, 1880. Subsequently, and after the expiration of the June term, 1880, in the same Grand Division, four judges of this court signed an order, in vacation, setting aside the judgment rendered at the January term, 1880, and ordering a rehearing of the cause. The present motion is to vacate that order and strike the cause from the docket. There is no pretence that the judgment of the 2d day-of February, 1880, was not entered of record as it was rendered, but the order was based entirely upon the fact that, upon subsequent reflection, certain members of the court who had consented to the judgment of the 2d day of February, 1880, had become dissatisfied with that judgment, and desired to hear further argument.

There is no authority for making the order so made, aside from the statute, and sec. 15 of chap. 37, Revised Statutes of 1874, contains all the statutory authority conferred upon judges of this court to make orders in vacation.

That section is as follows: “Whenever any judgment shall have been rendered in the Supreme Court which, upon further consideration, is found to have been erroneously entered up, the judges thereof are authorized, during vacation, to change the same without ordering a rehearing thereof, by entering a proper judgment in said cause; and in case a procedendo shall have been issued in such cause, the judges may recall the same, and by order of any of the judges, all proceedings taken by reason of such procedendo shall be vacated and set aside: Provided, that all such judgments shall be corrected within six months from the adjournment of the term at which they may have been rendered. ”

It will be observed that the power here assumed to be conferred upon the judges is not to grant rehearings, but when a judgment is found to have been erroneously entered up, to change the same without ordering a rehearing: The words “ rendered ” and “ entered ” are plainly used antithetically, and each in its distinctive correct legal sense,— “ rendered ” being used to indicate the giving of judgment, and “ entered ” to indicate the act of placing the judgment renclered on record,—in other words, enrolling or recording it. “Erroneously entering up a judgment” expresses only an error in the clerical act of placing it upon the record, and implies that the judgment enrolled or recorded is not the judgment “rendered” or given.

The words “upon further consideration, ” in this connection, clearly do not mean the act of giving judgment, but simply that upon further thought and reflection it-is discovered that the judgment rendered was erroneously—that is, incorrectly,—entered up. The further consideration is not, as contended by counsel, to be in reference to whether the judgment as rendered was a correct judgment or not, but whether the judgment as rendered is “ found to have been erroneously entered up.”

It is quite true, as the counsel argue, that the words “it is considered, ” are the language of courts in pronouncing judgment, but that is not the language here used. The language here being “upon further consideration, ” which, so far as we have discovered, is never used to express the act of rendering a judgment anew, but is always used to express the act of further thought, reflection and deliberation. The change authorized—that is, “to change the same,’’—unmistakably refers back for its antecedent to the erroneous entry, and authorizes, not the rendering, but the entering of a proper judgment—that is to say, a judgment in conformity with that rendered.

The argument sought to be drawn from the act of 1859 empowering the judges of the Supreme Court, or any four of them, to enter orders and judgments in vacation, etc., we do not regard .as of force in giving construction to this statute. The word “rendered” is not used in that statute at all, and so there is not any foundation for claiming that “ entered ” and “rendered” are ever used by the legislature as synonymous, and least of all where both words occur, as here, in the same sentence, and apparently each accurately in its own distinctive sense. The word “ entered, ” there, doubtless means “ cause to be entered, ” for it would seem quite clear that it intended a record of the judgment, order, etc., should be made, and not merely an announcement thereof, and this, of course, must be the act of the clerk. ° But to cause an entry to be made of a judgment, in vacation, in a ease which at the last term had been taken under advisement, of necessity implies that power shall be possessed to render the judgment or determine what the order shall be, and hence the power here expressly given carries with it the implied power to render the judgment, etc. The language used, therefore, instead of proving that .it means what it does not say, proves only that there is necessarily' implied a power, to express which in terms would have required other and different language.

Messrs. Isham & Lincoln, for the appellants, contra.

We deem it unnecessary to refer to the title of the act, or the previous practice of the court under this statute. The language is too plain to be controlled by such considerations.

We are unanimous in these views. The order must be vacated, and the cause stricken from the docket.

Cause stricken from the docket.

On a subsequent day of the January term, 1881, Mr. James McCabtney, Attorney General, in behalf of the People, in conjunction with counsel for the appellees, presented an application asking this court, of its own motion, to set aside the judgment of this court entered on the 2d day of February, 1880, and to grant another hearing of the cause.

Per Curiam :

This is an application made at this term of the court, by counsel for appellees, asking this court now, of its own motion, to make an order setting aside the judgment of this court entered on the 2d day "of February, 1880, reversing the decree of the circuit court in this cause, and asking this court now to grant another hearing of this cause.

This cause was first submitted for our consideration at the January term, 1878, and the opinion of the court was first filed on the 24th day of June, 1878, and a judgment was at once entered of record in accordance therewith, reversing the decree and remantling the cause. On petition of appellees, presented at the January term, 1879, a rehearing was granted at the January term, 1880, and at that term the cause was very elaborately argued by counsel, and on the 2d day of February, 1880, the original opinion, directing a reversal of the decree, was again approved and filed, and the same judgment was again entered in the cause. No proceedings in court have been had in this suit since that time. The June term of this court has intervened without any action by the parties seeking to disturb this judgment.

We have given this application careful consideration, and we think the same can not properly be allowed.

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Bluebook (online)
100 Ill. 484, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/blatchford-v-newberry-ill-1881.