28 Md. 477 | Md. | 1868
delivered the opinion of this Court.
In the refusal of the Court below in this ease, to allow the prayer of the defendant in the first exception, (designated in the record No. 2,) and the third prayer in the second exception, (designated No. 5,) referring to the non-joinder of Pal
In the second exception -we concur with the ruling below in the rejection of the prayers of the defendant, Nos. 1 and 2, {designated in the record, Nos. 3 and 4.) It was not necessary that all of the plaintiffs should have been originally concerned in arresting, securing and restoring the negroes .to the owner ; each one may have performed a part in the entire transaction, the whole of which, it was essential, should be proved, but it was not incumbent upon all of them to have acted at the same time. In order to establish a valid claim for their services, they were required to prove that it was through their agency, the alleged apprehension and returning of the property were secured, but that might have been effected by each performing a part. The right to demand the reward offered, could not be maintained until the negroes were -apprehended and placed in jail, in conformity to the advertisement, or delivered to the owner or his agent, and any person who aided in accomplishing such result, might join in a suit to recover the same. The second prayer in this exception (designated No. 4) is obnoxious to similar objection. If the jury believed that Clymer participated .in the securing and delivery of the negroes, although not in the arrest, he might properly be joined in the action.
We see no ground of reversal in the third-exception. The statement of the negroes were not evidence per se, and could only be introduced, if objected to, where they were a part of the res gestee, but not as distinct and independent testimony, as proposed to be detailed by Bath, the defendant’s witness. No testimony had been previously offered by the plaintiffs, of any declarations of the negroes, made at a time and place, in reference to which the witness, Bath, was required to testify. The testimony of the plaintiffs’ witness, Ratelidge, related to a different time.
In the fifth exception we see no ground of reversal in Nos. 1, 2, and 3 prayers of the plaintiff, (designated Nos. 2, 3, and 4,) but the 4th prayer (designated No. 5,) ought not to have-been granted. Although the legal proposition, involved in this prayer, according to the construction we put upon it, that an assignment or transfer by the plaintiffs, after their right of action had accrued, if such were the fact, could not operate to-defeat the action, and any evidence introduced for such purpose should not be regarded, yet the prayer was too general, and indefinite, and might mislead the jury and exclude from their consideration, testimony that ought to have been re
The plaintiffs could transfer no better or different claim than they themselves had, and their assignees would take it, subject to all the legal or equitable defences against it. But if the claim were a valid one, the fact of its being transferred to other parties, who had instituted suit in their names, would not defeat the action, nor affect the defence of the defendant against them or their assignees, who occupied no better position than they did at the time of the assignment. Act of 1829, ch. 51.
In the sixth exception, where the Court below directed the defendant’s prayers Ros. 1 and 3, in the 4th exception, which had been granted, or conceded, to be afterwards withdrawn at the instance of the plaintiffs, we see no sufficient reason for reversal. In the trial of the cause below, the Court is required to exercise a sound discretion within the rules of law. It was the right and duty of the Court, when called on for the purpose, to instruct the jury upon any prayers presented before the case was closed, and if no injustice has been done to any party by its action in the trial, there is no occasion for us to reverse its ruling in this particular.
Judgment reversed and proeedendo awarded.
Baktol, C. J., dissented.