8 Ga. App. 34 | Ga. Ct. App. | 1910
Busli and others sued Davison in the county court of Greene county. Before the trial.the plaintiffs demanded a trial by jury, under the act of 1908 (Acts 1908, p. 41), amending section 4200 of the Civil Code of 1895. The jury rendered a verdict for the plaintiffs for $156, and the defendant entered an appeal to a jury in the superior court of^ Greene county. When the case was reached for trial in the superior court, the plaintiffs moved to dismiss the appeal, ppon the following grounds: (1) The law does not authorize an appeal to be entered to the superior court from a verdict rendered by a jury in a county court. (2) Where a trial by jury has been had in a county court, the remedy of the party who is not satisfied with the verdict is certiorari, and not appeal.. (3) The defendant, having had a trial by jury in the county court, was not entitled to another trial by jury in the superior court. The judge of the superior court sustained the mo
Section 4200 of the Civil Codé of 1895 provides, that all trials in a county court “shall be by the court without a jury in all civil cases.” The act of 1908, supra, amended this section as follows: “The trial and judgment in said court [referring to county courts] shall be by the court with a jury of six, to be selected from a panel of twelve, each side being entitled to three strikes when demanded by either party ten days before the trial term,” etc. Section 4214, providing for appeals from county courts, was left unchanged, and that section provides: “If- either party is dissatisfied with the judgment of the county judge, and the principal sum claimed, or damages claimed, exceeds fifty dollars, said party may enter an appeal from such judgment within four days, under the same rules and regulations as are provided for appeals in this code.” It is contended by counsel for the plaintiff in error that the amehdator3r act of 1908, supra, was intended to meet the decision of the Supreme Court in DeLamar v. Dollar, 128 Ga. 57 (57 S. E. 85), tliat as to cases in the county' court, where the amount involved was less than fifty dollars, there could be no jury trial, and, therefore, the constitutional right of trial by jury was violated by § 4200, and that the legislature did not have under consideration in the amendatory act the subject of appeals from county courts, and there was no legislative intent to disturb- the law of appeals from that court, and if the amendatory act should be construed to take away the right of appeal where the trial was by jury in a county court, that result was inadvertent and unintended. But it is also insisted that the amendatory act of 1908 did not in fact forbid appeal in a county court from the verdict of the jury; that the right to appeal from the judgment of the court means a judgment not only of the court itself without the intervention of a jmy, but the judgment of the court rendered on the verdict of a jury; in other words, that although there may have been a verdict of the jury in the county court, the judgment thereon was none the less a judgment of the county court from which an appeal was authorized, although there may have been a verdict upon which the judgment was founded; and it is also insisted by learned counsel that to construe the act of 1908, supra, as taking away the right of appeal in a county court, where there has been a verdict of the jury,