Van Vliet versus Conrad

Supreme Court of Pennsylvania1880-11-08

95 Pa. 494

Summary · law.co

Holding. The judgment and order vacating the new trial were reversed and set aside, and a procedendo was awarded to allow the case to proceed from the point where it stood when the new trial was granted.

The lower court properly granted a new trial on November 17, 1879, based on a rule that had been filed earlier and then continued through a motion for rehearing. The defendant satisfied all conditions imposed by the court, including paying costs and posting a bond. Several months later, a different judge attempted to vacate the new trial order, questioning whether the associate judges had authority to act on the rule. The appellate court held that the motion for rehearing kept the original rule for new trial alive and pending, making it proper for the associates to act on it. The court emphasized that once a new trial was lawfully granted and the defendant complied with its terms, the defendant acquired a vested right that could not be taken away by the court's subsequent attempt to reverse its own order.

The appellate court found no defect in the regularity of the lower court's proceedings. The associate judges did not overstep their authority; they merely acted on a pending rule that the presiding judge had expressly referred to them for consideration and final decision. Since the new trial was granted by a court with full power to do so, and all conditions were satisfied, the defendant could not be deprived of that right through a belated reversal.

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

Key issues

Authority of associate judges to act on a rule for new trial referred to them by the presiding judge
Effect of a motion for rehearing in continuing consideration of a pending rule for new trial
Whether a court may reverse its own order granting a new trial after the defendant has complied with its conditions

Procedural posture

The defendant appealed from an order by the lower court vacating a previously granted new trial, challenging whether the court had authority to reverse the new trial order months after it was made and after the defendant had satisfied all conditions.

Authorities cited

No cited authorities resolved to law.co cases yet.

Opinion · public domain

majority opinion

Mr. Justice Gordon

delivered the opinion of the court,

The action of the court below, on the 17th of November 1879, granting a new trial, was not only regular, but final and conclusive. This action was founded on the rule taken May 24th 1879, the clay of the rendition of the verdict, which was continued by the motion for rehearing filed July 8th. As the conditions on which the new trial was granted were fully complied with, the judgment, improperly entered on the 9th of July, should have been stricken off and the parties allowed to proceed to a retrial of the case. Instead of this, we find the court, on the 11th of December, being then presided over by a-judge from a neighboring district, entertaining a rule to inquire into the regularity of the former proceedings, and the power of the associates to grant a new trial, which rule was, by the same judge, disposed of on the 19th of March 1880, by a vacation of the order for new trial. In support of this action, it is urged that the court had no power to entertain the rule for reargument after discharging the motion for a new trial, and in support of this view of the case, Spang v. The Commonwealth, 2 Jones 358, is cited. In this case, however, nothing was determined but that a rule to show cause why judgment should not be opened, does not operate to stay proceedings unaccompanied by an order to that effect, but it does not rule that the court could not, under that motion, have proceeded to open the judgment.

In the case in hand, the question is, did the motion for reargument continue the consideration of the previous rule for a new trial ? We think it did.

On the same day the order was made by the court discharging the first rule it entertained, or, what is the same thing, permitted to be filed a motion for the rehearing of that rule. Now, as both these acts occurred on the same day, and hence were legally cotemporaneous, the effect was to postpone the final consideration of the rule for a new trial to some future time and to annul the order then made. It follows that power was not wanting in the court to consider and dispose of as it did on the 17th of November, the rule thus pending. What then is wanting to the regularity of that action ?

It is said the associates had no power to overrule the previous act of the president judge; but they did nothing of the kind ; they only acted, as they had full power to do, upon a pending rule granted by the president judge himself; a rule, moreover, which he, in express terms, had referred to his associates for their consideration and final action.

The conclusion, resulting from the above-stated condition of affairs, is this : the new trial having been granted by a court having full power so to do, the defendant having complied with the conditions then imposed upon him, by paying the costs and giving a bond w’ith approved sureties for the security of the plaintiff, he could not be deprived of a right thus lawfully acquired, by an attempt of the court to reverse its own order some four months after it was made.

The remaining assignments of error we leave undetermined, thinking it better to send the case back with a procedendo, that it may be • proceeded in from the point where it was left when the new trial was granted.

The judgment of the court below, as well as the order of 19th March 1880, is reversed and set aside, and a procedendo awarded.