Burke v. Chicago & Northwestern R. R. Co.

108 Ill. App. 565, 1902 Ill. App. LEXIS 332
CourtAppellate Court of Illinois
DecidedApril 21, 1903
StatusPublished
Cited by21 cases

This text of 108 Ill. App. 565 (Burke v. Chicago & Northwestern R. R. Co.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Appellate Court of Illinois primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Burke v. Chicago & Northwestern R. R. Co., 108 Ill. App. 565, 1902 Ill. App. LEXIS 332 (Ill. Ct. App. 1903).

Opinion

Mr. Justice Dibell

delivered the opinion of the court.

This was an action on the case brought by Burke against the railway company to recover damages for personal injuries alleged to have been sustained by him by reason of the negligence of defendant’s servants. Plaintiff filed a declaration and defendant demurred thereto. The court sustained the demurrer and plaintiff elected to stand by his declaration. Judgment for costs was thereupon entered in favor of defendant. Plaintiff appeals. Defendant has entered its motion here to affirm the judgment because no bill of exceptions was taken, and because exceptions by plaintiff to the order of the court sustaining the demurrer, and to the judgment, are not preserved by a bill of exceptions, but only by recitals of the clerk in the record. This motion was taken with the case, and must first be decided.

In Hawk v. McCullough, 21 Ill. 220, a demurrer to the declaration was sustained; plaintiff excepted and abided by his declaration; the trial court gave judgment for costs against plaintiff, and plaintiff sued out a writ of error. The Supreme Court said:

“We take occasion to repeat here that an exception taken to overruling a demurrer is improper, for the point saves itself; it is a" part of the record by the demurrer, and needs no bill of exceptions to place it there.”

The judgment was reversed because of error in sustaining the demurrer. In Hamlin v. Reynolds, 22 Ill. 207, where the action of the trial court in sustaining a demurrer to certain pleas was assigned for error, the court said :

“ It is believed that no reported case can be found, either in Great Britain or in this country, in which it has been held that it is necessary to except to the judgment on a demurrer to enable a party to have the decision reviewed in an Appellate Court. * * * The judgment on the demurrer is as much a part of the record as any other judgment that is rendered by the court in the cause. The office of a bill of exceptions is to preserve that of record which otherwise would not appear of record. By the practice of courts of common law jurisdiction, the evidence in a cause, the decisions of the court in admitting or rejecting evidence, affidavits on motions and the reasons upon which such motions are made, the giving and refusing instructions, and various other matters, do not appear of record, and are no part of it, unless embodied in a bill of exceptions, and by that means made a part of the record in the case. In the decision of all such questions the judgment of the court is not usually spread upon the roll of its proceedings, while judgments by default, on demurrer, in case of non suit, final judgment on verdict, etc., have, by the practice at all periods, been so entered and regarded as. a part of the record. It would be improper practice to embody a judgment on a demurrer in a bill of exceptions, as it would uselessly incumber the record and unnecessarily add to the expense of litigation. The position that the judgment on the demurrer to the second and third pleas in this case was not excepted to in the court below, is wholly untenable.”

The court held there was error in sustaining the demurrer to one of the pleas. In Chase v. DeWolf, 69 Ill. 47, the trial court sustained a demurrer to defendant’s return to a petition for mandamus. The Supreme Court rebuked .appellant for preserving the action of the court below by bill of exceptions, holding it useless and contrary to correct practice, and said :

“ The petition, the return, the demurrer, and all orders of the court thereon, were matters of record, and acquired no additional force by being embodied in what is called a bill of exceptions.”

In Zimmerman v. Cowan, 107 Ill. 631, the trial court sustained a plea in bar to a petition to contest an election, and dismissed the petition. There was no bill of exceptions. It was held no bill of exceptions was necessary to enable the Supreme Court to review the action of the trial court. The plea was held bad and the judgment was reversed. In VanCott v. Sprague, 5 Ill. App. 99, the court, by McAllister, J., said:

"The record proper in a suit at law consists of the process by which the defendant is brought into court, including the sheriff’s return, the declaration, pleas, demurrer, if there is any, also any judgment upon demurrer, or other judgment, interlocutory or final; so that if judgment be given upon demurrer,, overruling or sustaining it, and is not waived by pleading over or upon default—and in the former case the demurrer is improperly overruled or sustained, or in the latter the service is not in time—or the declaration fails to set out a cause of-action, or the judgment is unauthorized by law, the party prejudiced may, on appeal or writ of error, assign error in the Appellate Court without any exceptions, or, having a bill of exceptions, because the errors arise upon the record proper.”

In Martin v. Foulke, 314 Ill. 206, rulings which relate to the pleadings, or appear on the face of the judgment itself, are expressly excepted from the requirement that they be presented by bill of exceptions. In Helmuth v. Bell, 150 Ill. 263, there was no bill of exceptions, but the court held the question was presented whether the declaration was sufficient to sustain the judgment. In Allen v. Haley, 169 Ill. 532, the ruling of the trial court upon demurrer to a plea was reviewed without a bill of exceptions. (Randolph v. Emerick, 13 Ill. 344; VanDusen v. Pomeroy, 24 Ill. 289; McChesney v. City of Chicago, 151 Ill. 307; Atkins v. L. T. Co., 79 Ill. App. 19; Whalen v. Muma, 94 Ill. App. 488.) Hone of the cases relied upon by defendant in support of its motion involved the ruling of the trial court' upon the pleadings. We are of opinion no bill of exceptions was required in this cause. The motion to affirm for want of a bill of exceptions, is therefore denied.

Each of the two counts of the declaration are lengthy, and very full in all details.

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Bluebook (online)
108 Ill. App. 565, 1902 Ill. App. LEXIS 332, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/burke-v-chicago-northwestern-r-r-co-illappct-1903.