Court Opinion

ID: 9832196
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-01 21:41:56.269981+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:43:43.948349
License: Public Domain

On Motion for Rehearing.
Appellant’s counsel, in charge of this cause, suffered an illness which seriously impaired his eyesight, and he requested an extension of time within which to file his motion for a rehearing. Believing his request a reasonable one, under the circumstances, we granted same, and extended the time thus given five days at his earnest request.
*551The motion having been filed within the time expressly granted, we have considered it.
Counsel for appellee has so ably and uniquely presented the matter of what is a substantial compliance with the law and rules governing the briefing of causes on appeal, that we take the liberty of quoting from same:
“Appellee does not oppose the consideration by this Court of Appellant’s so-called assignments because he believes that they show any reversible error; but his opposition to their consideration is inspired solely by a desire to see the game played fairly and according to the rules of the game. If Appellant’s contention, set forth at considerable length in its present motion, is correct, then the logical step will be to dispense with briefs entirely. This writer was never a stickler for a rigid, technical construction of the Courts’ rules. But he submits in all earnestness that, so long as we have rules, they ought to be observed and enforced at least to an approximate degree. Appel-lee’s motion does not go to the ■ extent of striking the brief in this case as was done in some of the cases cited by the Appellant. What we do contend is this: If an Appellant seeks to show reversible error by assignments of error, then such assignments should conform at least substantially to the rules governing assignments. If Appellant proposes to show reversible error under recent acts of the Legislature, then he should point out the error ‘upon which the appeal is predicated.’ It is not enough to merely file ninety-eight (98 generalities and call them assignments of error; but the new Legislative act requires the error upon which the appeal is predicated to be clearly and distinctly pointed out. If this were not so, we have in the instant case a splendid example of the chaotic conditions and unnecessary work which would follow in which an Appellate Court would be called on to choose, out of ninety-eight (98) alleged assignments, or if you please, out of thirty-one (31) uncorrelated propositions, and making a guess as to points upon which the appeal is actually based for reversal. It therefore is not sufficient to show the trial court perhaps committed some error; but the ever recurring question is, and should be, was such error alleged to have been committed by the trial court of such prejudicial character as to render it reversible in its nature. And it is such reversible error which, in some manner, must be distinctly and clearly pointed out and shown.
“Remember please, it is not ‘just errors’ we are looking for. The Good Lord knows merely ‘to err is human’ and it is our proneness to err which differentiates us humans from Deity. But the error this Court and all Courts are concerned with are real errors, substantial, prejudicial, and therefore reversible errors. And it is this kind of errors which the books say must be pointed out and in some manner distinctly assigned so- that our Appellate Courts may know, and not guess, upon which errors the appeal is predicated. If this interpretation of the rules is not just and correct, then we might as well abolish the rules and just write a letter to the Judge informing him that the trial court treated us in a terrible manner.”
The motion is overruled.