Court Opinion

ID: 6655760
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2022-07-20 20:57:38.060414+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:59:54.538176
License: Public Domain

The following opinion' on motion to retax costs was tiled November 2, 1904. Motion denied:
Sedgwick, J.
The plaintiff in error in this case, having been successful in this court, and being entitled to recover his costs incurred in this court, insists that the expense of obtaining the transcript of the evidence in the court below for the purpose of settling a bill of exceptions is a part of the costs in this court and should be taxed as such. The appellant or plaintiff in error, upon obtaining judgment in this court reversing the decree or judgment of the lower court, is entitled to recover his costs in this court without regard to the further proceedings after the case is remanded to the district court, and notwithstanding that he may be ultimately defeated in the litigation. The costs, however, in the district court, whether before or after the ajjpeal or proceedings in error in this court, are to abide tin; final result of the suit and to be taxed against the unsuccessful party. If the expense of settling the bill of exceptions is to he considered, under such circumstances, as costs in this court, this motion should be sustained; but if such expense is cost incurred in the district court, the motion must be overruled. National Masonic Accident Ass’n v. Burr, 57 Neb. 437.
Our code provides that a party objecting to the decision of a court must except at the time the decision is made, *520and time may be given to reduce tbe same to writing. Sec. 808. Tlie exception must be stated with so much of the evidence as is necessary to explain it. Sec. 809. If the decision objected to is entered on the record, and tin* grounds of objection appear in the entry, the exception may be taken by the party causing to be noted, at the end of the decision, that he excepts. Sec. 310. If the decision is not entered on the record or the grounds of objection do not sufficiently appear in the entry, the party excepting must reduce his exceptions to writing within a limited time after the adjournment of the term (sec. 311), and must submit the same to the adverse party for examination. If objections are made, and the judge has determined and approved a correct statement of exceptions, it is allowed by the judge and is made a part of the record of the case. For this purpose, it is filed by the clerk and preserved by him as the other records in the case. It seems to be admitted that the bill of exceptions then becomes a record of the district court. It never becomes a permanent record of the supreme court.
The code provides that the plaintiff in error shall file with his petition in error in this court a transcript of the proceedings containing the final judgment or order sought to be reversed, vacated or modified (sec. 586), and also that the clerk of the district court shall upon request, and being paid the lawful fees therefor, furnish an authenticated transcript of the proceedings to either of the parties to the same or to any person interested in procuring such transcript. Sec. 587. This, of course, involves making a copy of the whole record, which would include the bill of exceptions as a part of the records of the district court. By section 1, chapter 28, laws 1881, it was provided that, instead of copying the bill of exceptions into this transcript, the original bill of exceptions itself shall, on the request of any party desiring to prosecute proceedings in the supreme court, be attached to the transcriyd or record, and be certified by the clerk of the district court to be the original bill of exceptions.
*521After tlie case is disposed of in the supreme court, the hill of exceptions is to be returned to the district court upon the request of any party interested. Code, sec. 587c. If the appellant should take a transcript of the entire record of the district court, including the bill of exceptions, instead of having the original bill of exceptions attached to his transcript, his right to have the expense of such transcript taxed as costs in this court might, perhaps, be questioned on the ground that such expense was unnecessary; but there could be no doubt of his right to proceed in such manner or of the efficacy of such transcript. It is suggested that, in practice, bills of exceptions are usually procured to be allowed with the view of taking the case to this court upon appeal or proceedings in error, and that therefore it ought to be considered that thé expense of settling such bills is a necessary cost of this court. While it is true that bills are generally procured to be allowed with such purpose in view, yet it is not always the case. It sometimes happens that it is necessary that the records of the district court should be made thus complot e for use in that court. This seems to be contemplated by the statute which requires them to be settled in that court and makes them a part of the record there. By the practice in some of the districts of this state, the clerk has entered tin (expense of the bill of exceptions as costs in the case, when the bill of exceptions is filed with him as a part of the records of his office. This appears to be the correct practice. 11 Cyc. 232d; Pinney's Will, 27 Minn. 280.
In Palmer v. Palmer, 97 Ia. 454, the court appears to take a different view. It would seem from the opinion that the practice there is quite similar to our own, and that when the’bill of exceptions is settled, it is made a part of the record of the district court and, as such, filed in said court; and yet the court say: “It is to be remembered that the costs of the transcript follow the costs in this court because made upon appeal.” There is no explanation of the sense in which it may be said that these costs are made upon appeal. Possibly, the view above suggested *522was taken that, since bills of exceptions are usually settled with a view of prosecuting proceedings in the supreme court, the costs of the same should be considered as costs of the reviewing court ; but, as before stated, it seems to us that the rule to be derived from our statute and practice is otherwise. The view of the Minnesota court, as expressed in the case above cited, is in harmony with the provisions of our statute above quoted. We have noticed several decisions of other courts more or less directly bearing upon the question here presented, but none of them sufficiently discuss the statutes and rules of practice from which they are derived to make them available as authorities in this state. Among them may be noted the following: Hayes v. Livingston, 35 Mich. 371; Roby Lumber Co. v. Gray, 73 Mich. 356; Novotny v. Danforth, 9 S. D. 412; First Nat. Bank, v. North, 6 Dak. 136; Brown v. Winehill, 4 Wash. 98; Turner v. Muskegon Machine & Foundry Co., 97 Mich. 166.
We think that costs of settling the bill of exceptions are costs made in the district court, and should be taxed as such against the unsuccessful party in the final determina-of the litigation.
Motion overruled.