Case Name: SHARPE v. HUGGINS
Court: Supreme Court of South Carolina
Jurisdiction: South Carolina
Decision Date: 1920-04-12
Citations: 114 S.C. 40
Docket Number: 10400
Parties: SHARPE v. HUGGINS.
Judges: 
Reporter: South Carolina Reports
Volume: 114
Pages: 40–41

Head Matter:
10400
SHARPE v. HUGGINS.
(102 S. E. 789.)
1. Courts — Former Decision on Motion to Open Judgment Law or Case. — Where defendant’s original motion to open a judgment for excusable neglect was denied by the trial Court and the judgment affirmed, such decision is the law of the case, and is conclusive against a second motion to open the judgment on the ground of the same excusable neglect.
2. Judgment — All Evidence Should Be Presented on Original Motion to Open Judgment por Excusable Neglect. — On the original motion to open judgment for excusable neglect, all the evidence should be presented, and after denial of the first motion a second on the same ground cannot be granted on the theory that different evidence was presented.
Before Mauldin, J., Lexington, Spring term, 1919.
Order reversed and motion dismissed.
Action by Bunyan Sharpe against L. Virginia Huggins. From an order which opened the judgment on the ground of excusable neglect, plaintiff appeals.
Messrs. Bfird & Carroll, for appellant.
Messrs. George A. Alderman and William N. Gray don, for respondent
April 12, 1920.

Opinion:
The opinion of the Court was delivered by
Mr. Justice Gage.
The appeal is from an order of the Circuit Court which opened a judgment upon the ground of excusable neglect as is provided by section 225 of the Code of Procedure.
The order ought not to have been granted. An identical motion had been made by the defendant a year before the instant motion-was made; and it was denied by the Circuit Court, and that order was affirmed by this Court. 110 S. C. 180, 96 S. E. 256.
The first motion was made, as is the instant action, on grounds of excusable neglect; and the Circuit Court denied the first motion for the reason that the neglect was not excusable, and this Court on the authority of Gales v. Poe, 107 S. C. 483, 93 S. E. 189, affirmed that order. It is now said, however, that this Court affirmed that order for other reasons than that assigned by the Circuit Court, but that is not correct; the.order was affirmed On the authority of Gales v. Poe, 107 S. C. 483, 93 S. E. 189, and that case arose under section 225, and the Court there denied the motion because, the neglect was not excusable.
Therefore the matters now mooted were raised on a prior motion of identical character, and were there adjudged against the movant; that ends the controversy.
But it is said by the defendant that evidence was presented to the Court on the second motion different from that presented 'on the first motion. A sufficient answer to that is that all the evidence ought to have been presented on the first motion. See McDowell v. McDowell, Bailey Eq. 330.
The order below is reversed, and the motion is dismissed.