Taft v. Church

Decided October 19, 1895

Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court · decided 1895-10-19

<p> Power of Superior Court after Rescript to allow Discontinuance against one Defendant, and to order Judgment against the other Defendant, without amending Joint Finding. </p> <p>It is within the power of the Superior Court, after a rescript has been sent down by this court overruling the exceptions of one defendant and sustaining the exceptions of the other defendant, in an action pending in the Superior Court against them as partners, wherein the court found for the plaintiff, to allow the plaintiff to discontinue as to the latter defendant, and to order judgment against the former without amending the finding.</p>

Relies on Merchants' Insurance Co. of Providence v. Abbott · Taft v. Church · Gray v. Cook

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1895-10-19

How this case has been cited

Cited by 6 later decisions — most recently February 1931

6 state decisions

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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Field, C. J.

¶1It was within the power of the Superior Court to allow the plaintiff to discontinue the action as to the defendant Goode. Gray v. Cook, 135 Mass. 189.

¶2The contention of the defendants is that the finding should have been amended so as to show a finding against Church alone. In this case, as reported 162 Mass. 527, 533, it is said in the opinion: “ Although the action is against two persons as partners, and one only is held liable, judgment may be entered against him alone, under the Pub. Sts. c. 171, § 5, and no amendment of the declaration is necessary.” See Wiggin v. Lewis, 12 Cush. 486; Downing v. Coyne, 121 Mass. 347; Merchants’ Ins. Co. v. Abbott, 131 Mass. 397, 407.

¶3We see no necessity of amending the finding. On the whole record, it sufficiently appears that the finding stands against Church alone.

¶4 Exceptions overruled.