Case ID: minn_55/html/0443-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "Mitchell, J.", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

Horatio Houlton vs. Joseph Gallow.
    Submitted on briefs Nov. 21, 1893.
    Affirmed Dec. 7, 1893.
    No. 8567.
    Motion to set aside the service is not a waiver of defect in the' service.
    By appearing and moving to set aside the service of a summons on the ground that the complaint was not filed, and no copy of it served with the' summons, a party does not waive the irregularity in the service, although he does not expressly state that his appearance is special, and limited to-the purposes of the motion.
    Service of summons set aside.
    
      Held, also, that in this case there was no error in setting aside the service of the summons.
    Appeal by plaintiff, Horatio Holton, from an order of the District Court of Wright County, Seagrave Smith, J., made May 8, 1893* setting aside the service of the summons in the action.
    By his complaint the plaintiff claimed that he was an explorer of lands in Northern Wisconsin and at the request of defendant* Joseph Gallow, imparted to him much valuable information regarding pine timber on the land belonging to the United States.That defendant was thereby enabled to and did select, settle upon and purchase a quarter section of the public lands having much valuable pine timber upon it. That defendant promised to pay plaintiff for his said services and information what they were reasonably worth. That they were worth $1,000 for which sum he demanded judgment.
    The summons was served upon defendant personally on April 24, 1893, at Minneapolis. No copy of the complaint was served. The original complaint was prepared and verified at Duluth on April 25, and mailed to the Clerk of the Court at Buffalo, the County Seat, where it was received and filed on April 26. Defendant moved the Court on notice and affidavits to have the service set ■aside and the action dismissed on the ground that no complaint was on file when the summons was served. The Court granted the motion and plaintiff appeals.
    
      Spencer á Alford, for appellant.
    Plaintiff admits that the failure to file the complaint was an irregularity, but defendant waived it by his motion, which was in •effect a general appearance in the action. Yale v. Edgerton, 11 Minn. 271; Tyrrell v. Jones, 18 Minn. 312; Curtis v. Jackson, 23 Minn. 268; Cover tv. Clark, 23 Minn. 539; Kanne v. Minneapolis á ■St. L. By. Co., 33 Minn. 419.
    
      Robb é Slack, for respondent.
    Defendant did not by his motion make a general appearance and thereby waive all irregularities. This is the issue on this appeal. Defendant accepts as the rule of St. Louis Car Co. v. Stillwater ■Street Ry. Co., 53 Minn. 3 29, that an appearance for any other purpose than to question the jurisdiction of the Court, is general. But the appearance in this action was for the purpose of questioning the jurisdiction and was not general. Millette v. Mehmke, 26 Minn. 306.
   Mitchell, J.

The summons in this action was regular upon its face, and was served in the manner provided by statute. It stated that the complaint was filed, but in fact it had not been, and no •copy was served with the summons. On this ground the defendant made a motion to have the service of the summons set aside, and the action dismissed. The motion was confined to this specific purpose, but the attorneys signed the notice of motion as “attorneys for defendant,” without expressly limiting their appearance to that purpose. This the plaintiff, in the original brief, claimed amounted to a general appearance, which waived all defects in the-service of the summons. Had the defect compláined of gone to the jurisdiction of the court over the person of the defendant, there might possibly have been something in the point, although it will appear from the general tenor of our decisions on the subject that, in determining whether an appearance was general or special,, we have looked to the purposes for which it was made, rather than to what the party had labeled it. But it is settled by Millette v. Mehmke, 26 Minn. 306, (3 N. W. 700,) that the court acquired jurisdiction by the service of the summons, and that the failure to file or serve the complaint was a mere irregularity, the remedy for which was by motion to set aside the service; and it was never held that an appearance by making a motion for the sole purpose of' taking advantage of an irregularity amounted to a waiver of it. So far from being a waiver of the irregularity, it is just the reverse-of it. In a supplemental brief, counsel seem to admit this, and to abandon their original ground, but claim that the court did not,, under the circumstances, exercise a proper discretion in setting aside the service of summons. The only showing made by plaintiff in opposition to the motion was an affidavit by one of his counsel that, at the time he issued the summons, he was informed and believed that defendant was about to leave the state before he could prepare and file a written complaint, and that defendant would be absent from the state a long time, and that he (counsel) after-wards prepared a complaint, without unnecessary delay, which was filed on the second day after the service of the summons.

(Opinion published 57 N. W. Rep. 141.)

Assuming that a showing might be made which "would require the court to refuse to set aside the service of the summons notwithstanding the irregularity, yet this affidavit failed to make out any such case. Foraught thatappeared on the hearing of the motion, the defendant might still have been within the state, so that new service might have been made on him.

Order affirmed.