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52 Cal. 336

Sedgwick v. Sedgwick

California Supreme Court

Decided July 1, 1877

California Supreme Court · decided 1877-07-01

The plaintiff was the executrix of the estate of Thomas Sedgwick, Jr., who died in February, 1874. This was an action on two promissory notes given by the defendant to the plaintiff during his lifetime. The defendant offered himself as a witness in his own behalf, in reference to one of the notes. The Court received his testimony subject to an objection interposed by the plaintiff, but on final argument struck it out. The defendant excepted.

Relies on Blood v. Fairbanks · Mitchell v. Haggenmeyer

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1877-07-01

How this case has been cited

Cited by 10 later decisions — most recently June 1973

10 state decisions

2018771880189019001910192019301940195019601970decided

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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¶1By the amendment to the Code of Civil Procedure, made in 1874, the Legislature precluded parties to an action from testifying therein when the action is against an executor or an administrator of a deceased person upon a claim or demand against the estate of such deceased.

¶2The present action on the note is by the executrix, and not against her, and is on a demand in favor of the estate of her testate, and not against said estate.

¶3D. S. Terry and W. L. Dudley, for the Respondent, cited Blood v. Fairbanks, 50 Cal. 420, and Mitchell v. Hagenmeyer, 51 Cal. 108.

By the Coubt :

¶4The third subdivision of section 1880, Code Civil Procedure, as amended in 1874, provides that the following persons cannot be witnesses: “ Parties to an action or proceeding, or in whose behalf an action or proceeding is prosecuted, against an executor or administrator, upon a claim or a demand against the estate of the deceased.” This action is brought by the executrix, and is brought, upon a demand, not against, but in favor of the estate, and therefore does not fall within the above cited provision. The Court erred in excluding the testimony of the defendant.

¶5Judgment and order reversed, and cause remanded for a new trial.

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