Case Name: Collins vs. Boyd
Court: Kentucky Court of Appeals
Jurisdiction: Kentucky
Decision Date: 1837-05-06
Citations: 5 Dana 316
Docket Number: 
Parties: Collins vs. Boyd.
Judges: 
Reporter: Kentucky Reports
Volume: 35
Pages: 316–317

Head Matter:
Collins vs. Boyd.
[Mr. Breck for plaintiff: Mr. Turner for defendant.]
From the Circuit Court for Madison County.
May 6.
The act of 1831 provides that a non-resident’s deed may be acknowledged before a judge or justice of a court, and such acknowledgment being certified, &c. with a certificate of the clerk of the court &c. with his seal annexed &c. the deed shall be effectual &c: held that this statute should not be construed strictly, and that any seal that the clerk is accustomed to use on such occasions, may be deemed his seal of office, within the meaning of the act, tho’ it may be described in his certificate, as his private seal, there being no seal of office provided.

Opinion:
Judge Ewing-
delivered the Opinion of the Court.
The defendant in this case offered a deed in evidence, which seems to have been recorded in the proper county, upon the certificate of a Justice of the County Court of Montgomery county, State of Missouri, of the due acknowledgment of the deed before him, and the certificate of the clerk of the County Court of said county, over his own signature, and with "his own private seal annexed, (no seal of office being yet provided,) at Lewisburg, the 20th day of May, 1833."
The deed was objected to as evidence on the sole ground, that the clerk had not certified it "with the seal of his office annexed," as required by the statute of 1831, Statute Laws of Kentucky, 451.
We are not disposed to stick to the letter in the construction of the statute.
If that seal is annexed by the clerk which he has been accustomed to use, it is, pro hac vice, the seal of his office, and comes within the contemplation of the Legislative requisition.
We will presume, that his own private seal, which he annexes, is the seal which has been recognized and adopted by his Court as his official seal for the occasion, and as such, it subserves all the purposes of authentication under our statute.
The deed should not, therefore, have been rejected by the Circuit Court.
Judgment reversed, and cause remanded, that a new trial may be granted.