CLAY v. SMITH

Supreme Court of Georgia1899-07-21

108 Ga. 189

Summary · law.co

Holding. The judgment of the trial court overruling the motion for a new trial is affirmed. The appellate court concluded that Clay's procedural defects in raising his objections prevented review of the charge, and that the evidence was sufficient to support a verdict in Smith's favor.

Clay and Smith both claimed a fund held by the sheriff. At an earlier stage, the appellate court had affirmed the trial court's decision to reject Clay's initial challenge. The case then proceeded to trial, where a jury verdict favored Smith. Clay sought a new trial, arguing that certain portions of the judge's jury instructions were legally erroneous.

Clay's appeal failed on procedural grounds. In his motion for a new trial, Clay's only objection was that the charged propositions were not good law—a general complaint without specifics. Later, in his bill of exceptions prepared for appeal, Clay's counsel raised detailed criticisms of the charge for the first time. The court found these new objections came too late; they should have been raised at trial through a proper exception to the instructions. Additionally, the appellate court noted that the challenged propositions, reviewed in isolation, stated correct legal principles.

Summary generated by law.co from the public-domain opinion. The opinion text itself is public domain.

Key issues

Procedural requirement to except to jury instructions during trial, not for the first time on appeal
Whether general objections to a jury charge suffice without specific assignments of error
Standard of review for trial court discretion in denying a new trial when verdict is supported by conflicting but sufficient evidence
Finality of appellate determination of the law of the case in earlier proceedings

Procedural posture

Clay appealed the trial court's judgment entered on a jury verdict favoring Smith and the denial of Clay's motion for a new trial.

Authorities cited

No cited authorities resolved to law.co cases yet.

Opinion · public domain

majority opinion

Lumpkin, P. J.

At the October term, 1895, this court affirmed a judgment of the trial court overruling a demurrer to the plaintiff’s petition. See 97 Ga. 782. Subsequently Clay, who was a claimant of the fund in the hands of the sheriff, was made a party, and the case proceeded to a trial on the merits, resulting in a verdict in favor of Smith, the other claimant. Clay made a motion for a new trial, which was overruled, and he excepted.

In the fourth, which is the only special, ground of this motion, a portion of the charge of the court is in general terms alleged to be erroneous. Without setting forth this particular extract from the charge, it is sufficient to say that it contained at least two propositions which are, in the abstract, correct statements of the law. This being so, the ground of the motion just referred to presents no cause for reversing the-judgment denying a new trial. Anderson v. Southern Railway Co., 107 Ga. 500.

In the bill of exceptions counsel for the plaintiff in error undertake to set forth divers objections to the portion of the charge complained of in the fourth ground of the motion for a new trial, and to state numerous reasons why the same should not have been given. No such objections or reasons appear, however, in the motion for a new trial. Though the charge may be open to the criticisms thus for the first time suggested in the bill of exceptions, it by no means follows that the court below committed error in refusing to grant a new trial, when, on the hearing of the motion therefor, the only objection apparently urged against the charge was that none of the propositions therein contained could rightly be considered as good law. Furthermore, it may pertinently be observed "yet once again” that this being a court of review, its province is to pass upon such questions only as were raised before and directly ruled upon by the trial court. It is to be rioted that the present bill of exceptions contains no direct assignment of error upon any instruction given by the court to the jury. On the contrary, the only exception taken is that the judge overruled each and every ground of the motion for a new trial. But even had counsel for the plaintiff in error undertaken in the bill of exceptions to directly assign error upon that portion of the charge which they deemed objectionable, such exception would have come too late, for their writ of error, though sued out in due time to review the judgment overruling the motion for a new trial, was not tendered until after the expiration of the time allowed by law for excepting to instructions given or rulings made upon the trial of the case.

When this case was first here, this court decided that, upon the facts alleged in Smith’s petition, he was entitled to the fund in the sheriff’s hands. Thus the law of the case was definitely and finally settled; and as the evidence introduced at the trial now under review was, though conflicting, sufficient to warrant a finding in his favor, we can not undertake to say that the trial judge abused his discretion in denying a new trial.

Judgment affirmed.

All the Justices concurring.