Coutts v. Walker

2 Va. 268
CourtCourt of Appeals of Virginia
DecidedJune 15, 1830
StatusPublished

This text of 2 Va. 268 (Coutts v. Walker) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Virginia primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Coutts v. Walker, 2 Va. 268 (Va. Ct. App. 1830).

Opinion

Gkeen, J.

The principal question is, Whether Walker's judgments overreached the deeds under which the appellant claims ? This precise question was determined in the affirmative in The Mutual Assurance Society v. Stanard; but it is said, that, in that case, the point passed sub silentio, and without discussion; and that, although at the common law, the whole term was considered as but one day, and all the judgments therein related to the first day thereof, and overreached all intermediate conveyances of and charges upon the debtor’s lands; yet that was because the time when the judgment was actually rendered, never appeared on the record, all being enrolled as of the term generally, or as of the first day of the term : that in consequence of our statutes, requiring that the proceedings of all our courts shall be signed by the presiding judge, either daily at the adjournment of the court, or the next morning at its sitting, and that all office judgments, not set aside during the term, shall be entered as judgments of the last day of the term, the actual time of the entering of every judgment necessarily appears on the record, and consequently takes away the foundation of that rule of the common law. j This general principle of the common law, like many others, is of such remote antiquity, and so long recognized without dispute, that the reasons and policy on which it was founded, are, in a great degree, left to conjecture. One reason is assigned arguendo in the case of Wynne v. Wynne, cited at the bar: that all the suitors whose cases are in such a [277]*277situation as to entitle them lo a judgment on tbe first day of the court, ought to be in the same situation, and none to have any advantage over another, and as it is impossible for the court to give judgment in all such cases in one day, the only means of putting them upon a footing of equality, is to refer all given in the same term to the first day, and give them the same effect as if they were really so. Another reason may have been to prevent debtors from withdrawing their property from the effect of judgments against them, by alienations made after it was known that in the course of the term a judgment would pass. Whatever was the foundation of the rule, it operated uniformly as between different creditors, and the creditors of and purchasers from the debtor, without any exception, so far as I have been able to discover, until the case of purchasers was provided for by the statute 29 Car. 2. cli. 3. § 14. which required, that tbe true date of all judgments should be noted on tbe margin of the roll, and provided that tliey should bind, as to purchasers, only from such date. Before that statute, judgments confessed in vacation, under powers of attorney previously given for that purpose, related to the first day of the preceding term, and overreached intermediate alienations. To remedy this mischief, of allowing judgments confessed upon powers of attorney, when no previous suit was depending, to overreach intermediate alienations, was the chief object of the provision of the statute on that subject, as appears by its preamble. An attempt was made to remedy this mischief, partially, before the statute, by the power of the court, in an anonymous case in Sid. 222. in which a judgment., entered in vacation, upon a warrant of attorney given in vacation, was set aside, because, relating to the first day of the preceding term, it would be a great danger to purchasers; although it was insisted, that it might he held to be good against the party, and void as to purchasers, which was denied, and die judgment was set aside, because if it remained and bound the party, it must also bind purchasers from him. The courts in England, always had the [278]*278means of ascertaining the dates of all proceedings in the suits depending in them, as appears from the frequent questions which have been made as to the effect of those proceedings. Thus, a statute acknowledged the 22d January, after the first day of the term, was overreached by a judgment bn the 23rd. Standford v. Cooper, Het. 72. Cro. Car. 102. Hutt. 95. Garrard v. Norris, Latch, 53. So, in Jenk. 250. cited 18 Vin. Abr. Relation. D. pl. 3. p. 293. a case is stated, where a fine levied after a statute acknowledged in the same term, overreached the statute. But cases might occur, in which judgments might be rendered during a term, which could not by possibility relate to the first day; as where it appears, that the plaintiff’s case was not in a condition for a judgment on the first day, if the court had been prepared to hear it, and some further proceeding was indispensably necessary to mature his case for judgment. As, in the case of a common recovery, the prcecipe being returned to the first day of the term, and the tenant appearing and vouching to warranty, and a summons ad xoarrantizandum awarded returnable to a future day in the term ; if the vouchee die before the return day, the recovery is void; Wynne v. Wynne, 1 Wils. 42. Or, if the return day be Sunday, which is not dies juridicus, and the vouchee dies on that day, and a judgment is afterwards given, it is void, because no judgment could lawfully be given on Sunday. But if the return day had been a juridical- day, upon which a valid judgment could have been given, the subsequent judgment would have related to the return (essoign) day, and been good, notwithstanding the death of the vouchee on the return day; Swann v. Broome, 3 Burr. 1596. In these cases, there was an impossibility that the judgments should have been given on the first day of the term, the vouchees not appearing gratis, and upon that impossibility the judgments turned, Tidd’s prec. 376. These are the only adjudged cases I have met with, in which exceptions have been allowed to the general rule; and they are founded upon obviously good reasons, that might very [279]*279well apply to all cases, in which it appeared that the plaintiff’s case could not be matured for judgment, on the first clay of the term. There is a dictum of lord Holt in 3 Salk. 212. repeated by counsel arguendo, and admitted by the court, in Miller v. Bradley, 8 Mod. 190. that the relation does not exist, if there is a memorandum to the contrary; as where there is a continuance of the cause until another day in the same term. But the occasion or circumstances, under which this dictum fell from lord Holt, or the purpose to which it was applied, is not stated by Salkeld. It is hardly sufficient to overturn the common law doctrine, applied particularly to the lien of judgments, that the whole term is in law but one day, and that the first day.

Our legislature, in incorporating into our statutes, such of the english statutes as it thought fit to adopt, and abrogating all others, has omitted the provision of the statute 29 Car. 2. in respect to the effect of judgments as to purchasers, probably for this reason, that the chief mischief intended to be remedied by it, the confession of judgments upon warrants of attorney when no previous suit was depending, could not exist here, because our statutes had long prohibited such judgments.

Our statutes directing the daily proceedings of the courts to be signed by the presiding judge or justice, declare the purpose of that requisition to be, to prevent errors in entering up judgments, and can hardly have intended to abrogate, incidentally, the rule of the common law, which considers the whole term as one day.

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Bluebook (online)
2 Va. 268, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/coutts-v-walker-vactapp-1830.