Case ID: njl_41/html/0182-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "Beasley, Chief Justice.", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

JOHN HOPPER, PLAINTIFF IN ERROR, v. JAMES LUDLUM, DEFENDANT IN ERROR.
    Counsel fees cannot be recovered by action, unless a contract fixing the; amount can be shown.
    On error.
    For the plaintiff in error, A. B. Woodruff.,
    
    For the defendant in error, A. 8. Jaclcson.
    
   The opinion of the court was delivered by

Beasley, Chief Justice.

This was a suit by a counselor at law for his counsel fees. At the trial, a non-suit was ordered, the judge who presided assigning as his ground of action, “ a rule of law which says that no counsel can maintain a suit against his client for counsel fees, unless he can show an express agreement upon the part of that client to pay a specific fee that is fixed upon as the counsel fee.”

This, as ifc'seems to me, was a correct exposition of the law as it has always existed and been understood in this state. Such is the rule embodied in the decisions of our courts; but it is not ne9essary for me to review these decisions, or to express, with any degree of elaboration, my views upon the subject, as I have so recently had occasion to do this in the case of Schomp v. Schenck, 11 Vroom 195.

I think the judgment should be affirmed.

For affirmance — The Chancellor, Chief Justice, Dalrimple, Depue, Knapp, Scudder, Woodhull, Clement, Dodd, Green, Lilly — 11.

For reversal — None.