Court Opinion

ID: 9536563
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 07:02:27.833432+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T14:54:45.078558
License: Public Domain

WELCH, J.
(concurring specially in result). Under the circumstances here shown I do not agree that this administrator plaintiff had such exclusive control over the action after trial thereof had commenced as is implied by the majority opinion. I think when the administrator commences such an action and prosecutes it to trial and permits the trial to be commenced and conducted by his attorneys and by the real parties in interest, while he himself remains away, and for the purpose of the trial he is legally present by such representation and that he is fully bound by every legal act done and permitted in the trial of the case and that it is all binding on him the same as if he were actually present in person.
And when such administrator so permits the case to be brought to trial and trial commenced in his absence, I do not believe that he has such control over the trial proceedings by any private agreement between him and his attorneys, as is implied by the majority opinion. I think any contrary conclusion would be against public pol*574icy and might seriously impair the orderly administration of justice if such theory were carried to its logical conclusion.
I therefore think the majority opinion erroneous in recognizing or implying such powers in the administrator in this case.
However, I think the trial court in passing upon an application to vacate a judgment for irregularity in obtaining it has a wide discretion, since it is addressed to his sound legal discretion under the rule of our decisions in McKinney v. Swift, 135 Okla. 164, 274 P. 659, and Nation v. Savely, 127 Okla. 117, 260 P. 32. I think the action of the trial court in vacating this judgment might be sustained as an action within his sound legal discretion, and I therefore concur in the result.