47 Ky. 386 | Ky. Ct. App. | 1848
delrveied the opinion of the Court.
Upon a decree in favor of Duff against Combs, rendered in the year 1837, no fieri facias nor other proceeding for its enforcement was taken, until the-day of October, 1844, when a writ of fieri facias was sued out. To obtain a supersedeas and quashal of this writ, as having been irregularly and illegally issued, without a scire facias to revive the decree, Combs applied by petition for a writ of error coram vobis, which was granted by the order of two Justices of the County Court, authorized to grant injunctions, &c. The Clerk to whom the order was directed, issued a subpoena, with injunction, instead of a proper writ of error coram. vobis. And the parties having come into Court on this process, the defendant demurred to the writ of error coram vobis, and moved to dismiss it. But the Court overruled the demurrer and motion, and pronounced a judgment quashing the fieri facias, and giving Combs his costs.
The subpoena with injunction, though certainly not a writ of error coram vobis, seems to have been so regarded by the parties, and it had the desired effect of superseding the execution, until the alledged error could be acted on by the Court. And as it brought the de
The question then is, whether after a dekiy of more than a year and a da3q to take any steps for enforcing the decree, and when no obstruction was presented by the defendant, a fieri facias can properly be issued on the mere direction of the complainant, without the order of the Court. If it cannot, then even if the scire facias' is not the onty appropriate mode of obtaining the requisite order, still as there wras in fact no order, and this was apparent on the record, the execution was subject to quashal without notice, and there is no ground of complaint in this case.
The enforcement of decrees in chancery by common law writs of execution as allowed by our statutes, is cumulative, and gives to a decree in regard to the mode of its execution, a double character. It may still be enforced by the mode appropriate to the Court of equity, or it may be enforced by the mode appropriate to a judgment at law. Each of these modes of proceeding! as originally applicable to its own subject, viz: a decree or a judgment, was governed by distinct laws
Under these statutes it is at the option of the party obtaining, a decre'e for money, &c. to regard ft as a mere decree enforcible as such by equitable modes of proceeding, or to regard it as if if were a judgment,-and to enforce it by ordinary execution. On this principle it wmsdecided in the case just referred to,- that although a decree might, as a chancery proceeding# be revived against the administrator of a deceased defendant by bill, yet as: the statute authorized executions on decrees1 in like' manner as on judgments# it might be revived by scire facids, Which was the oppropriate mode" of reviving a judgment. But there is no other mode' of having a writ of execution on a judgment on which no execution has issued for a year and a day, but by scire facias; in other words, a writ of execution on a judgment, is not# under such circumstances, appropriate or allowable# Unless-authorized by an order of the Court on a scire facias'. And it s'eems to follow necessarily# that under similar circumstances, a writ of fieri facias is not allowable' upon a decree, until authorized in the same manner as-Would be' required in Case of a judgment.
In suing out a fieri facias in this case, the party ha's placed himself and his process, under the rules and principles applicable to process upon judgments- at law. And as afi.fa. or Other execution could -not legally be isS'ued 'On a judgment after a year and a day from it»
Wherefore, the judgment is affirmed.