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137 Ind. 106

Keifer v. Summers

Indiana Supreme Court

Decided January 4, 1894

Indiana Supreme Court · decided 1894-01-04

<p>Costs. — Judgment for. — Assignment of Fees. — Set-Off.—Where parties against whom judgment for costs has been rendered have procured an assignment to them of certain of the fees which had accrued in such case, such parties are entitled to have the fees thus assigned set off against the judgment for costs; and the judgment and execution are good only for the difference between the fees held by the judgment defendants and the judgment for costs.</p> <p>Same. — Fees.—Interest, Not Entitled to. — While a judgment for costs, as any other judgment, bears interest according to law, there is no statute providing for interest on fees, and the witness or officer takes his fees as taxed, without interest.</p> <p>Same. — Judgment for. — Personal Property. — Fees, Liability for. — Payment.— Credits. — A judgment for costs is the personal property of those in whose favor it is rendered, and the parties against whom such judgment is rendered owe a judgment for costs, but do not owe the fees; the fees are collectible from the parties who procured the services for which the fees are due, and could be collected from no one else. And, in such case, the judgment defendants could not pay fees owing by the judgment plaintiffs, and then call upon such plaintiffs to give them credit for such payment; for no one can volunteer to pay another’s debt and then insist on repayment.</p>

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1894-01-04

How this case has been cited

Cited by 12 later decisions — most recently May 1983

1 federal appellate · 11 state decisions

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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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¶1*113On Petition eor. a Rehearing.

Howard, C. J.

¶2The appellees ask for a rehearing of this case, contending that the complaint showed facts that entitled them to an order setting off the fees held by them against an equal amount of costs held by the appellants, and that the execution for costs should have been decreed satisfied to an amount equal to such fees.

¶3We think that the complaint and the judgment of the trial court were sustained to that extent. The opinion states: “The question is … whether the fees owned by one party are in the same right as the costs owned by the other, and whether they may, therefore, be mutually set off against each other. … We think it clear that such fees and costs may be so set off, and that the court might rightfully decree the satisfaction of either fees or costs to the extent of such set-off. ’ ’

¶4The complaint, however, proceeded upon the theory not only that such set-off of fees against costs might be had, but also that the fees so set off were equal to the costs, and, consequently, prayed “that the court adjudge and decree that said judgment is fully compensated, paid and satisfied, and that said execution is fully compensated and satisfied.”

¶5That was the end and object aimed at by the complaint, and we must treat the complaint here according to the theory on which it was drawn, and upon which it was treated in the trial court. The fees not being equal to the judgment for costs and interest, there could be no cancellation of the judgment nor relinquishment of the levy. Appellees are entitled to the set-off, so far as it reaches, and the judgment and execution are good only for the difference between the fees held by appellees and the judgment for costs held by appellants.

Filed Mar. 16, 1894.

¶6Appellees strenuously argue that they are entitled to interest upon their fees. Interest, however, as already said, is a creature of the statute; and there is no statute authorizing interest upon fees, while the statute does provide that all judgments, including judgments for costs, shall bear interest.

¶7This question, and some others ably discussed in the brief for a rehearing, have already been fully considered in the opinion.

¶8The petition for a rehearing is overruled.

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