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130 Ind. 545

Champ v. Kendrick

Indiana Supreme Court

Decided March 10, 1892

Indiana Supreme Court · decided 1892-03-10

<p>Appeal. — Final Judgment. — In an action to quiet title, where all tlfe defendants demurred to the complaint, but one, who filed . a cross-complaint, and judgment was rendered against the demurrants, and the cause continued on the cross-complaint, the judgment was notfinal, and can not be appealed from.</p> <p>Same. — Jurisdiction.—Where the judgment appealed from is not a final judgment, the consent of the parties will not give the Supreme Court jurisdiction.</p>

Relies on Western Union Telegraph Co. v. Locke · Mignon v. Brinson · Davis v. Davis

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1892-03-10

How this case has been cited

Cited by 26 later decisions — most recently May 1961 · most notably Mak-Saw-Ba Club v. Coffin (1907), Voorhees v. Indianapolis Car & Manufacturing Co. (1895)

26 state decisions

9018921900191019201930194019501960decided

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.

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Miller, J.

¶1This was an action to quiet the title to real «state brought by the appellee against the appellants and Milton Shirk.

¶2*546- The defendants, other than Shirk, demurred to the complaint. Their demurrers were overruled, and final judgment rendered against them on demurrer, quieting the title of the real estate described in the complaint.

¶3This appeal was brought to reverse this judgment.

¶4The finding of the court is, that the plaintiff “ have judgment against the defendants, other than the defendant Milton Shirk, and this cause is continued on defendant Shirk’s cross-complaint.”

¶5The judgment rendered upon this finding concludes with this statement: “And this cause is continued on cross-complaint of defendant Milton Shirk.”

¶6Appeals, except in a few specified instances, will only lie to this court'from final judgments. Section 632, R. S. 1881.

¶7A judgment is not final unless all the issues of law and fact are determined, and the case completely disposed of, so far as the court had power to dispose of it. Western Union Tel. Co. v. Locke, 107 Ind. 9.

¶8In that case this language from Freeman on Judgments is quoted with approval.

¶9“ The policy of the laws of the several States and of the United States, is to prevent unnecessary appeals. The appellate courts will not review cases by piecemeal.”

¶10There is no final judgment in favor of the plaintiff where one of the defendants is not mentioned in the judgment. A judgment to be final must dispose of the case as to all of the parties, and finally dispose of the subject-matter of the litigation. Masterson v. Williams (Texas), 11 S. W. R. 531; Mignon v. Brinson, 74 Tex. 18; Schultz v. McLean, 76 Cal. 608; Watkins v. Mason, 11 Ore. 72; State, ex rel., v. Temptin, 122 Ind. 235.

¶11If the judgment is not final, this court is without jurisdiction. Wingo v. State, 99 Ind. 343; Mignon v. Brinson, supra.

¶12Even the consent of parties can not give this court jurisdiction where the judgment appealed from is not a final *547judgment. Shroyer v. Lawrence, 9 Ind. 322; Davis v. Davis, 36 Ind. 160; Wingo v. State, supra; Western Union Tel. Co. v. Locke, supra.

Filed March 10, 1892.

¶13Appeal dismissed.

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