35 Mo. 517 | Mo. | 1865
delivered the opinion of the court.
This is an action to recover a balance due by defendant to plaintiff, growing out of the lease of certain premises to defendant’s intestate, Philip Uhrig. The suit was commenced in the lifetime of said Philip Uhrig, in the Circuit Court of St. Louis county, by attachment, under the provisions of the “Act concerning Landlords and Tenants.” Philip Uhrig, by his attorney H. N. Hart, filed a plea in the nature of a plea in abatement; and, on the first day of March, 1862, on motion of plaintiff, the defendant’s plea was stricken out, and ten days’ time given him to plead. On the 13th day of March, 1862, the plaintiff took a default against the defendant for failing to plead, and at the September term, 1862, (Philip Uhrig, in the mean time, having departed this life,) Caroline Uhrig, the widow and administratrix of Philip Uhrig, filed a motion to set aside the interlocutory judgment and permit her to plead, for reasons set forth in certain affidavits which accompany her motion. The affidavits of herself and another person, setting forth that when the suit was first instituted against Philip Uhrig, he had employed Henry N. Hart, an attorney at law, to defend. said action for him;
These being substantially the facts of the case, the court below overruled the motion to set aside the interlocutory judgment, and proceeded to enter up a final judgment against the defendant.
The only error complained of in the court below, is in refusing to set aside the interlocutory judgment in order that the defendant might plead to the merits of the cause. In such cases the inferior courts have very wide discretionary power, which ought to be exercised in such .a way as to promote the ends of justice as far as possible. But it would be very unsafe for this court to undertake to revise the errors of the inferior courts in the mere exercise of their discretion, and ought not to be done unless manifest injustice has resulted from the action of the court below, and I am not prepared to say that such is the fact in this case. If there was any
The affidavit of defendant was also insufficient in not setting out fully what defence, if any, she had to the plaintiff’s cause of action, so that the court might see from the facts whether there were merits in her defence.
the judgment is affirmed.