Case ID: how-pr_4/html/0077-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "Edmonds, Justice.", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

SUPREME COURT.
    Lewis L. Squire agt. Joseph Elsworth and others.
    In an action on contract for the recovery of money only, where there is a failure to answer, the clerk, in ascertaining the amount the plaintiff is entitled to recover (under section 246 of the code,) should make and file with the judgment roll, a report of his finding; analogous to the former practice of making and filing reports upon assessment of damages.
    
      New York Special Term, August, 1849.
    —This is an action on contract for the recovery of money only, and the complaint is not sworn to. The question is, in what manner is plaintiff to obtain his judgment.
   Edmonds, Justice.

By section 246th of the amended code, the action not being on an instrument for the payment of money, but being on account for goods sold, the clerk is to ascertain the amount which the plaintiff is entitled to recover.

This, however, is to be done by the clerk in due form. It will not do for him merely to take the oral examination of the party or his witness, and then insert the amount in the judgment roll. He must make .and file with the record a report of his finding, like the report on assessment under the former practice, so that the defendant may have some means of ascertaining what is the decision of the clerk in the premises, some means of correcting any errors into which he may fall. That report will be annexed to, and form a part of the record.

Any other practice than this will necessarily leave matters very much at loose ends, and may deprive parties of the power of correcting errors in the assessment.

The clerk is substituted for the former sheriff’s jury of inquiry; and there is no reason why he should not, as was formerly the practice, make a report of his decision between the parties.