Case Name: John Emerton versus Nathaniel Andrews
Court: Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court
Jurisdiction: Massachusetts
Decision Date: 1808-11
Citations: 3 Tyng 653
Docket Number: 
Parties: * John Emerton versus Nathaniel Andrews.
Judges: 
Reporter: Massachusetts Reports
Volume: 4
Pages: 572–573

Head Matter:
* John Emerton versus Nathaniel Andrews.
A, being in the service of B, and having engaged to pay his own board, applied to C to board him, and proposed to him to take his pay in goods out of B’s store, to which B consented, and promised he should be so paid: in an action by C against B for the board of A, this latter was offered as a witness for the plaintiff ; and these facts coming out on examining A, on the voir dire, he was rejected as interested in the event of the suit.
This action in assumpsit for a sum of money due for the board of several workmen while in the service of the defendant, and for some small articles sold and delivered, was tried at the sittings after the last November term in this county, before Sewall, J., upon the general issue.
At the trial, the plaintiff reduced his demand to the charges for the board of Christopher Beals, and for the articles sold. Beals, being produced as a witness, and objected to, was sworn on the voir dire. On his examination, he declared that having engaged to work for the defendant, he was to pay for his own board ; that on the defendant’s advising him to board in town, he, Beals, requested the plaintiff to board him, and take his pay in goods at the defendant’s store. This the plaintiff agreed to, and on proposing it to the defendant, he consented, and verbally promised the plaintiff that he should be paid in that manner for Beals’s board ; that he then boarded with the plaintiff, and was considered by him as likewise answerable for the payment of his board. On this examination, the judge rejected Beals as interested, and therefore incompetent to charge Andrews in this action. The other charges being admitted by the defendant, a verdict was taken for the amount of them only, subject to the opinion of the Court, whether Beals was a competent witness, and whether the facts thus disclosed by him on the voir dire, if proved by paroi testimony only, would support this action.
The cause stood continued to this term ; and now Story, for the plaintiff, contended that the witness ought only to have been inquired of generally on his voir dire, whether he was interested in the suit, and expected to gain or lose by the event of it; and if he answered this inquiry satisfactorily, should have been sworn in chief, in which case his testimony would have gone to the jury, and might have been sufficient to support the plaintiff’s demand. If it be said that the witness disclosed all the facts that could have come out, if he had been sworn in chief, the objection remains that the jury were not permitted to decide upon his testimony.
Putnam, for the defendant.

Opinion:
* By the Court.
We are satisfied that the rejection [ *654 ] of the witness in this case was right. If the plaintiff, who produced Beals, prevailed, then Beals would be discharged from any demand for his board by the plaintiff; and in an action brought against him by the plaintiff for his board, he might give in evidence the judgment on the verdict in this cause, and satisfaction of it, to defeat the action. But if Beals was not interested, it would have been useless to the plaintiff to have sworn him; for, laying the statute of frauds out of the question, his testimony would have proved, if any thing, a special contract made by the defendant with the plaintiff to pay for the witness's board in goods, which testimony would have disproved the contract on which the action was brought.
Judgment must be entered on the verdict