Sullivan v. Radford
Sullivan v. Radford
Opinion of the Court
This suit was commenced before a justice of the peace of Deepwater township, Henry county, by the filing of an account for wages alleged to have been earned by William 0. Sullivan, who had
No objection to the jurisdiction of the justice of Davis township was interposed but defendant appeared, a jury was called and a trial, in which defendant participated, was held, resulting in a verdict for the plaintiff. In due time defendant appealed to the circuit court and afterward filed a motion attacking the jurisdiction of the circuit court on the ground that the justice of Deepwater township acquired no jurisdiction pf the action because of the absence of a legal party plaintiff and, consequently, that neither the justice, to whom the cause was sent on change of venue, nor the circuit court, could acquire jurisdiction by an amendment attempting to supply a legal plaintiff. This' motion was overruled and the cause was tried before a jury. Defendant appeared at the trial and defended the action on the merits. He was defeated and appealed to this court from a judgment recovered by his adversary. It appears that plaintiff was a resident and defendant a nonresident of Henry county.
The question of the jurisdiction of the circuit court is vigorously argued in the briefs and is the only question raised by defendant we deem of sufficient importance to discuss. Section 7399, Revised
We shall concede for argument that plaintiff could not maintain an action in his personal capacity and, therefore, that the action brought in Deepwater township had no legal party plaintiff, but this concession does not necessitate the conclusion that the justice in Davis township could not acquire jurisdiction of the person of defendant.. We are mindful of the rule announced by some of the authorities that if there is no legal entity in plaintiff there is no foundation upon which to base an amendment (30 Cyc. 27), but even if we should give our sanction to that rule it would not aid defendant. The filing of the amended or new statement supplying a legal plaintiff may be treated as the bringing of a new action and since defendant voluntarily appeared to that action, he must be held to have waived the issuance and service of process and to have subjected his person to the jurisdiction of the court (Section 7410, Revised Statutes 1909). Other reasons might be given in support of the jurisdiction of the circuit court but we have sufficiently answered the contention of defendant in what we have said. The motion attacking the jurisdiction was properly overruled. ' The objections of defendant to the rulings of the court on evidence and in the instructions to the jury have been examined and are found to be without merit.
The judgment is affirmed.
Case-law data current through December 31, 2025. Source: CourtListener bulk data.