Court Opinion

ID: 9864836
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-25 16:13:32.503078+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:32:10.973792
License: Public Domain

Mr. Justice Bouck
specially concurring.
I concur in the judgment of reversal, directing the district court to overrule the demurrer to the second defense, which is based upon alleged violation of the so-called loan shark law of 1913. But why limit the defendants to this one affirmative defense? Why and by what procedure can their fourth defense be “eliminated” by this court as “moot”? The defendants, setting forth the full facts, allege in this defense that the interest charged against them under the promissory note here involved is unconscionable. This is legally either a good defense or not. If it is, and if the facts should support the claim, this would be a good independent defense even though the 1913 statute were not invoked, or though for any reason whatever the second defense were withdrawn from the case altogether. If unconscionableness is not a *586good defense, this court ought to say so by declaring that- the lower court properly sustained the demurrer to it. A defendant has the right to plead and rely upon as many defenses as he wishes, whether consistent with one another or not. See Denison, Code Pleading in Colorado, section 269. We ought not to annihilate, arbitrarily and of our own motion, any integral part of the pleadings prepared by the litigants presumably with a view to ultimate trial on the merits in the court below. Such annihilation is not within the lawful power of this court.