150 N.E. 650 | Ill. | 1926
The Armour Grain Company brought an action of the first class in the municipal court of Chicago against the Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, Chicago and St. Louis Railroad Company. The statement of claim filed alleged that the Armour Grain Company delivered to the railroad company various car-loads of grain for transportation in interstate commerce; that the railroad company did not deliver all of it and that the Armour Grain Company sustained a loss thereby, for which the railroad company was liable. The railroad company filed an affidavit of merits, admitting that it had issued bills of lading covering the shipments in question but denying all the other material allegations in the statement of claim. After these pleadings had been filed the Armour Grain Company asked leave of court to file certain interrogatories, which leave was granted, the interrogatories filed and the railroad company ruled by the court to answer the same. The railroad company did not comply with the rule, and the court entered a rule upon it to show cause why it should not be punished for contempt of court. Upon the hearing upon the rule to show cause the court found the railroad company guilty of contempt of court for not answering *158 the interrogatories and fined it $50. To review this judgment the railroad company perfected an appeal to this court and has also sued out a writ of error. The two cases have been consolidated by order of this court.
Section 32 of the Municipal Court act, with reference to interrogatories in civil actions, is as follows: "That the municipal court in any civil suit pending therein, at any time before the trial or final hearing thereof, may permit the filing therein of interrogatories to be answered by any party to such suit or any person for whose immediate benefit such suit is prosecuted or defended, or by the directors, officers, superintendent or managing agents of any corporation which is a party to the record in such suit, at the instance of the adverse party or parties or any of them, and to require an answer under oath to all such interrogatories as the party to be interrogated might be required to answer, if called as a witness upon the trial or hearing of such suit, but the party filing such interrogatories shall not be concluded by. the answers thereto, if he shall elect to introduce the same or any or either of them upon the trial or final hearing." (Smith's Stat. 1925, p. 844.)
The railroad company contends that the statute concerning interrogatories in the municipal court of Chicago, as construed and applied by the municipal court, is unconstitutional because it interferes with and unreasonably burdens interstate commerce, contrary to the third clause of section 8 of article 1 of the constitution of the United States; because it is contrary to the Interstate Commerce act and the Transportation act of 1920; and because it takes private property without just compensation, contrary to the fifth amendment to the constitution of the United States, because it denies to the railroad company due process of law. In the view which we take of this case we do not deem it necessary to decide or discuss these questions.
The railroad company also contends that under the proper construction of this statute the court did not have *159
jurisdiction or power to require a corporation, as such, to answer interrogatories of any kind. This section of the statute has never been before a court of review in this State upon the question here involved. In construing a statute it is the duty of the court to read the entire statute and from the words used therein by the legislature determine the legislative intent in enacting the same. In Hill v. Jeffery Co.
The judgment of the municipal court of Chicago is therefore reversed.
Judgment reversed.