Case Name: BERGER v. SAUL & COMPANY
Court: Supreme Court of Georgia
Jurisdiction: Georgia
Decision Date: 1900-01-26
Citations: 109 Ga. 240
Docket Number: 
Parties: BERGER v. SAUL & COMPANY.
Judges: A ll the Justices concurring.
Reporter: Georgia Reports
Volume: 109
Pages: 240–241

Head Matter:
BERGER v. SAUL & COMPANY.
Under the constitution and laws of this State, a justice’s court has no jurisdiction to hear and determine an action of trover. When, however, such a case was tried in the justice’s court and an appeal entered from the judgment rendered therein to the superior court, and si judgment in the latter was rendered in favor of the plaintiff, a motion to arrest such judgment, made at the term at which it was rendered, should have been granted, because the jurisdiction of the superior court as to the subject-matter on appeal was no larger than the jurisdiction of the justice’s court in which the suit was first instituted.
Argued December 11, 1899.
Decided January 26, 1900.
Bail-trover. Before Judge Lumpkin. Fulton superior court. March term,. 1899.
S. C. Crane and J. K. Hines, for plaintiff in error.
Arthur Heyman, contra.

Opinion:
Little, J.
Saul & Company instituted an action of trover with bail against Berger, in a justice's court in Fulton county, to recover certain articles of personal property. A verdict and judgment were rendered for the defendant, and the plaintiff appealed to the superior court. On the trial of the case in the latter.court a verdict was rendered for the plaintiff, and judgment followed. At the same term the defendant moved in arrest of the judgment so rendered, on the ground that, as the justice's court had no jurisdiction over an action of bail-trover, the superior court acquired no jurisdiction by appeal. The judge of the superior court overruled the motion in arrest, and ruled that a justice's court had jurisdiction in a case of bailtrover, and second, because of the time and manner of making the point. To this judgment the defendant in the court below excepted. That a justice's court has no jurisdiction in an action of trover has been settled by the decisions of this court, in the cases of Dorsey v. Miller, 105 Ga. 88, 90, and Blocker v. Boswell, ante, 230. Having.no jurisdiction, an appeal to the superior court gave .to the latter no larger jurisdiction than was possessed by the justice's court, which was none at all. Hufbauer v. Jackson, 91 Ga. 301; Greer v. Burnam, 69 Ga. 734; Stansell v. Massey, 92 Ga. 436. By section 5363 of the Civil Code it is provided that a motion in arrest of judgment must he made during the term at which such judgment was obtained. See also Hartridge v. Wesson, 4 Ga. 101. So that the motion to arrest was in time; and as the justice's court had no original and the superior court no appellate jurisdiction over the subject-matter of the suit, the judgment rendered in the superior court should have been arrested.
Judgment reversed.
A ll the Justices concurring.