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128 F.2d 888

Docket No. 12180.

Jones v. Thompson

Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals

Decided June 22, 1942.

Rehearing Denied July 9, 1942.

Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals · decided 1942-06-22

2 counsel of record

Key passage — most relied on by later courts

“[m]otions to vacate orders, motions for rehearings or for new trials, and like motions are addressed to the discretion of the trial court and are intended to call its attention to errors allegedly committed by it and to afford an opportunity for their correction. Orders granting or denying such motions are not appealable.”

quoted by 3 later decisions, including Oksanen v. United States, Clark v. Wyrick

“An appeal from the denial of a motion to vacate an order is not the equivalent of an appeal from the order itself,”

quoted by 1 later decision, including Metal Fabricators, Inc. v. Granite City Steel Co.

Relies on Wayne United Gas Co. v. Owens-Illinois Glass Co. · Conboy v. First National Bank · Irving Trust Co. of New York v. Nelson

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1942-06-22

How this case has been cited

Cited by 34 later decisions (2 by the Supreme Court) — most recently April 1983 · most notably Pfister v. Northern Illinois Finance Corp. (1942), Microwave Communications, Inc. v. Federal Communications Commission (1974)

29 federal appellate · 1 state decisions

12019421950196019701980decided

Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.

View the full empirical analysis of this case →

¶1Tom J. Terral, of Little Rock, Ark., for appellant.

¶2Richard M. Ryan, of Hot Springs, Ark. (Henry Donham, of Little Rock, Ark., on the brief), for appéllees.

¶3Before STONE, SANBORN, and THOMAS, Circuit Judges.

¶4SANBORN, Circuit Judge.

¶5On May 9, 1941, an order was entered by the District Court of the United States for the Western District of Arkansas dismissing the complaint of the appellant upon the ground that it shows upon its face that the cause of action stated is barred by the statute of limitations. On August 7, 1941, the appellant filed a motion to vacate the order of dismissal, and on September 3, 1941, he filed an amended and substituted motion to vacate the order. The District Court on September 3, 1941, denied the appellant’s amended and substituted motion to vacate the order of dismissal, and on September 9, 1941, the appellant filed a notice of appeal “from the order of the District Court of the United States for the Western District of Arkansas, Hot Springs Division, said order denying amended and substituted motion and motion to vacate order of dismissal, said order having been entered in said court on the date of September 3rd, 1941.”

¶6The appellant asserts that the District Court erred in dismissing his complaint, and also erred in denying the motion to vacate the order of dismissal.

¶7The appellees have filed a motion to dismiss this appeal upon the ground that it was not taken from the order of dismissal within three months from the date of its entry.

¶8While it is, no doubt, true, as appellant asserts, that his motion to vacate the order dismissing his complaint had the effect of extending the time within which he might appeal from that order, the fact is that he has not appealed from it, but has *889appealed from the order denying- his motion to vacate and set aside the order of dismissal.

¶9 Motions to vacate orders, motions for rehearings or for new trials, and like motions are addressed to the discretion of the trial court and are intended to call its attention to errors allegedly committed by it and to afford an opportunity for their correction. Orders granting or denying such motions are not appealable. Conboy v. First National Bank of Jersey City, 203 U.S. 141, 145, 27 S.Ct. 50, 51 L.Ed. 128; Wayne United Gas Co. v. Owens-Illinois Glass Co., 300 U.S. 131, 137, 57 S.Ct. 382, 81 L.Ed. 557; In re Federman, 2 Cir., 119 F.2d 754, 756; In re McIntosh, 9 Cir., 95 F.2d 627; State of Missouri v. Todd, 8 Cir., 122 F.2d 804, 806. An appeal from the denial of a motion to vacate an order is not the equivalent of an appeal from the order itself. In re Schulte-United, Inc., 8 Cir., 59 F.2d 553, 559, 560. In State of Missouri v. Todd, supra (p. 807 of 122 F.2d), this Court said: “We cannot review an order from which no appeal has in fact been taken, or transmute an appeal from a nonappealable order into an appeal from an appealable order which has not been appealed from.”

¶10The appeal is dismissed for want of jurisdiction to entertain it.

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