Hart v. Potter
Hart v. Potter
Opinion of the Court
delivered the opinion of the court.
An application to amend a bill of complaint after the cause bad been submitted for consideration, and decision comes so late in the proceedings that the granting of it is largely within the discretion of the chancellor, and where the evidence of the fact sought to be inserted in the bill might be manufactured for the occasion, it is usually denied. But where, as here, the evidence of a fact in the chain of complainant’s title is a part of the public records of the country, which may not be altered or affected by any ingenuity of pleading or false swearing of a witness, and especially where the commencement of a new case merely to insert such additional fact might be the means by mere lapse of time of rendering it less available to the party as by a bar of the statute of limitations, we think a sound discretion would have justified the amendment. Wherefore the decree dismissing complainant’s bill is reversed, and the case is remanded to the docket of the chancery court with leave to complainant to amend his bill within thirty days from the time the mandate is filed therein.
Reversed.
Reference
- Full Case Name
- Philip Hart v. Matthew Potter
- Cited By
- 1 case
- Status
- Published
- Syllabus
- Chancery Pleadings. Amendments. After submission of cause. Discretion of cowrt. When disallowance reversible error. The allowance of an application to amend a hill in equity, made after the submission of. the cause for final decision on the merits, is ordinarily in the discretion of the court; but it is reversible error to disallow such an amendment which simply seeks to plead a recorded deed, a necessary link in complainant’s chain of title to the land in controversy, where a new suit would probably be barred by limitation.