Court Opinion

ID: 9613501
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 04:17:36.102506+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:03:29.637632
License: Public Domain

On Motion for Rehearing.
It is contended in the motion for rehearing that “There is no portion of the trial court’s charge from which this court can infer that the jury were authorized to consider the disregarding of the stop sign in question as a matter of fact,” in connection with the ruling made in the third division of the opinion, supra. The trial judge stated in his charge to the jury: “Whether there was a stop sign there, and whether or not in was violated as contended by the defendant in this case, are questions of fact for you to determine from the evidence submitted to you,” and he defined negligence as “the absence of or the failure to exercise the degree of 'care required by law to be exercised,” which is ordinary care, “and the definition of ordinary care is just that degree of care which every prudent person would exercise under the same or similar circumstances.” This contention is without merit.
It is further contended that we have overlooked the case of Overstreet v. W. T. Rawleigh Co., 75 Ga. App. 483 (2) (43 S. E. 2d, 774), in holding that the plaintiff could object to evidence offered in support of the allegations of the defendant’s answer as to which no ruling on demurrer had been made, where the evidence was inadmissible for the reasons stated in division 2 of the opinion. In the Overstreet cáse, the authorities cited, in support of the proposition that either party has the right to introduce evidence in support of the pleadings as laid, held that it was error to grant a nonsuit (Clark v. Bandy, 196 Ga. 546, 27 S. E. 2d, 17), or to direct a verdict for the defendant (Phillips v. Southern Ry. Co., 112 Ga. 197, 37 S. E. 418), where the plaintiff had proved his case as laid. The ruling in the Phillips case was questioned and limited in Kelly v. Strouse, 116 Ga. 872, 897, 898 (43 S. E. 280), and neither the Phillips case nor the Clark case, supra, held that the defendant has a right to sustain by proof the allegations of a plea which sets forth no defense. That the defendant does not have such a right was held in Crew v. Hutcheson, 115 Ga. 511 (2) (42 S. E. 16), and this rule was approved and followed in Kelly v. Strouse, 116 Ga. 872, *876879 (2) (supra); Williams Mfg. Co. v. Warner Sugar Refining Co., 125 Ga. 408, 411 (54 S. E. 95); Halliday v. Bank of Stewart County, 128 Ga. 639 (1) (58 S. E. 169); Walden v. Walden, 124 Ga. 145 (2) (52 S. E. 323); Porter v. Davey Tree-Expert Co., 34 Ga. App. 355, 356 (1) (129 S. E. 557). This court is bound to follow these previous rulings by the Surpeme Court and by this court, and we decline to follow the ruling of Over-street v. W. T. Rawleigh Co., supra, which appears to be in conflict with the cases herein cited.

Rehearing denied.

Felton and Worrill, JJ., concur.