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94 Mich. 577

Toliver v. Brownell

Michigan Supreme Court

Decided February 10, 1893

Michigan Supreme Court · decided 1893-02-10

<p>Justices' courts — Docket entry — Jurisdiction—Return to certiorari.</p> <p>The docket entry of a justice of the peace of the date when a judgment was rendered cannot be changed by his return to a writ of certiorari, so as to show that he was out of the State on the day named, and that the judgment was actually rendered the day previous, when he was within his jurisdiction, and erroneously entered on his docket as of the following date; citing Weaver v. Lammon, 62 Mich. 366.1</p>

Relies on Weaver v. Lammon

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1893-02-10

How this case has been cited

Cited by 5 later decisions — most recently December 1922

5 state decisions

301893190019101920decided

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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Grant, J.

¶1Plaintiff brought suit in justice’s court against the defendant. The suit was tried upon June 17, and judgment reserved.. Subsequently the justice rendered judgment, which appears upon his docket of date June 21. In his return to the writ the justice says that he was absent, in Chicago, the entire of June 21; that said judgment was in fact rendered June 20, but was erroneously entered upon his docket as rendered the 21st.

¶2Upon its face the judgment was valid. This is a direct proceeding in the case to question the jurisdiction of the justice, and is a proper proceeding for that purpose. The docket entry must control, and a justice of the peace cannot change his docket for the purpose of taking away or conferring jurisdiction. Weaver v. Lammon, 62 Mich. 366. The justice, in this case, could not have rendered judgment on the 21st, because he was beyond his jurisdiction. Under the decision above cited, he cannot now be heard to say that his docket is erroneous, and that he rendered judgment on another day, when he was within his jurisdiction.

¶3It follows that the judgment must be reversed, and the proceedings quashed.

The other Justices concurred.
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