Case Name: JOSEPH STERN and Others, Executors, etc., of ELIZA EISNER, Deceased, Respondents, v. SAMUEL L. EISNER, Appellant
Court: New York Supreme Court
Jurisdiction: New York
Decision Date: 1889-01
Citations: 58 N.Y. Sup. Ct. 224
Docket Number: 
Parties: JOSEPH STERN and Others, Executors, etc., of ELIZA EISNER, Deceased, Respondents, v. SAMUEL L. EISNER, Appellant.
Judges: 
Reporter: Supreme Court Reports (Hun)
Volume: 58
Pages: 224–226

Head Matter:
JOSEPH STERN and Others, Executors, etc., of ELIZA EISNER, Deceased, Respondents, v. SAMUEL L. EISNER, Appellant.
Witness, interested in the event of the action, competent to testify to a conversation ■ between a decedent and a third pa/rty.
The change made, hy the enactment of section 839 of the Code of Civil Procedure, in the language of the Code of Procedure, precluding a witness interested in the event of the action from testifying in regard to personal transactions with a deceased person, has not changed the rule which allows a witness, under such circumstances, to testify as to a conversation, had between such deceased person and a third party, overheard by the witness.
Lobdell v. Lobdell (36 N. Y., 333) followed.
Appeal from a judgment entered March 23, 1888, in New York county, upon the verdict of a jury, rendered by the direction of the court, at the New York Circuit, and from an order denying a motion for a new trial.
G. P. Avery, for the appellant.
G. W. Carr, for the respondents.

Opinion:
Van Brunt, P. J.:
This action was brought by the plaintiffs, as executors of the will of Elizabeth Eisner, deceased, to recover from the defendant the sum of $1,000, money loaned by the deceased in her lifetime to the defendant, such loan being evidenced by the promissory note set up in the complaint. The answer denied any loan or indebtedness. Upon the trial of the action the defendant was examined as a witness on his own behalf, and he was asked whether he had ever been present when his mother, the deceased, was having a conversation with anyone else about this claim, and he answered "Yes;" he was then asked: " State what you heard her say and to whom; that is, not yourself, but anyone besides yourself ? " This was objected to as conflicting with the provisions of section 829 ; the objection was sustained and exception taken. He was then asked: " What conversation did you hear your mother have with your sister Mary about it?" Objected to on the same ground; objection sustained and exception taken. This seems to have been error.
In the case of Lobdell v. Lobdell (36 N. Y., 333), where a similar question was asked of a party who was testifying, it was expressly held that such a question did not come within the language of the section, and that, under such circumstances, the transaction or communication in question was not between himself and the deceased person, but between the deceased and a third person, and for that reason did not come within the provisions of the section. It is true there is a slight change in the language of the Code as it existed at the time of that decision,-but there does not seem to have been any change which renders the reasoning of that case inapplicable to the section of the present Code above referred to. The change of the language seems to have been only another instance of the many which are found in the present Code, where, for some unexplained reason, language well understood, and which had been interpreted by numerous decision, is altered to satisfy the whim or caprice of the codifier, for no other reasonable ground can be given for making it.
The judgment should be reversed and a new trial ordered, with costs to appellant to abide event.
Daniels, J., concurred.