Piltz v. Yonkers Railroad

83 A.D. 29, 82 N.Y.S. 220
Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of the State of New York·Decided May 15, 1903·Published·Cited by 5 cases

Opinions

Jenks, J.:

A jury was waived in this action for negligence, and the court made a decision in the short form authorized by section 1022 of the Code of Civil Procedure, upon which the plaintiff entered judgment. As the appellant failed to take or file exception to the decision, the respondent insists that we are powerless even to review the rulings upon evidence made during the trial. Several decisions of this court in another department are cited by the learned counsel, of which some expressly sustain his contention. Examination of these authorities shows that for the most part they are based upon Otten v. Manhattan Railway Co. (150 N. Y. 395). I am not convinced that our opinion in Reiners v. Niederstein (55 App. Div. 80) did not state the true rule; that, notwithstanding the absence of the exception provided for by section 1022 of the Code of Civil Procedure, we have the power to examine the rulings of the trial court upon questions of evidence to which exceptions were then taken.

Section 1022 does not expressly prohibit such review in the absence of the exception therein described. It seems to recognize an appeal although that exception be neither taken nor filed, and, as Vann, J., says in the Otten Case (supra), the exception is not a [31] substitute for the notice of appeal. It has been held that the omission to file an exception precludes an attack upon the decision. (Ross v. Caywood, 162 N. Y. 259, 265, and authority cited.) This being so, and if the failure to file this exception also precludes a review of the rulings, then the appeal would be a vain thing. I think that the full penalty of the omission to file the exception is expressed in these decisions of the Court of Appeals. The ground is acquiescence. But acquiescence in the decision does not imply acquiescence in the rulings. For the decision may be legally unobjectionable upon the evidence received, and yet, if the rules of evidence as insisted on by appellant had been observed, some of tjie essential facts found were not legally proven. The defeated party may stand upon the latter ground. He may acquiesce in the decision while consistently protesting against the rulings which made it. possible in law. In Otten’s Case (supra) the court, per Vann, J., discussing the exception provided for in section 1022 of the Code, say: “We see no reason for any difference in the meaning .of the same word, as thus used in the Constitution and the Code. It appeared in section 1022, when the Constitution was framed. Its function under that section is the general function of an exception, which is a protest against the decision of a court. (Sterrett v. Third Nat. Bank, 122 N. Y. 659, 662.) It is not a substitute for a notice of appeal, which, instead of being dispensed with, is expressly required by the same sentence that authorizes the exception to be filed. Its office is apparently the same as that of the exceptions mentioned in section 994 of the Code, which makes provision for excepting to a decision of a court or referee where the facts found are separately stated. It was by virtue of this exception alone that the Appellate Division had power to review either the facts or the law, and the order of reversal, which could not have been made if the exception had not been filed, is, as we think, an order granted on an exception. (Baldwin’s Bank of Penn Yan v. Butler, 133 N. Y. 564.)” May not some of the decisions before referred to have been made upon the authority of the final clause of this excerpt without full consideration of the context? If the function of this exception is like that of other exceptions — protest — I fail to see why it should be required to mark a protest against a ruling theretofore marked by a protest, namely, the exception taken thereto. Why should a [32] protest, general in its character, be required, in addition to a special protest aimed directly at the subject-matter ? Why should the absence of a general exception be deemed to make the special exception unavailing when the office of the former seems to be for protest against the decision, inasmuch as its absence is held to show acquiescence in the decision ? If a party can logically both acquiesce in the decision and protest against the rulings of the court, I do not see why his exceptions to the rulings, standing on the record, should be disregarded. Further, if the office of the exception provided for in section 1022 be the same as that of the exception mentioned in section 994, as is said in the Otten Case (supra), we may consider the effect of an omission to take the latter exception. Such omission does not prevent a review of the rulings. (Lanier v. Hoadley, 42 App. Div. 6.)

This is not an equity decision. It is the same as a general verdict by a jury (Amherst College v. Ritch, 151 N. Y. 282, 320), and as on an appeal from a judgment entered upon a verdict the court may review the exceptions taken on the trial (Third Avenue R. R. Co. v. Ebling, 100 N. Y. 98), I do not see why the same rule should not obtain in this case rather than the rule of the Court of Chancery.

A reading of the opinions in both Ross’ Case (supra) and the case cited therein (Hecla Powder Co. v. Sigua Iron Co., 157 N. Y. 437) shows that in each case the court assumed that the exceptions to the rulings could have been considered despite the absence of an exception to the decision.

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Piltz v. Yonkers Railroad, 83 A.D. 29, 82 N.Y.S. 220 (N.Y. Ct. App. 1903).

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