28 Minn. 461 | Minn. | 1881
Gen. St. 1878, c. 84, entitled “Forcible Entries and Unlawful Detainers,” contains provisions as follows: Section 2. “Any justice of the peace has authority to inquire, as hereinafter directed, as well against those who make unlawful or forcible
The action at bar was brought under section 11, chapter 84, above cited, and in the municipal court of St. Paul, under Gen. St. 1878, c. 64, § 87. By the latter section it is enacted that such court shall, “have all the powers and jurisdiction conferred on justices of the peace by chapter eighty-four, General Statutes, and the proceedings shall be-the same as therein provided, except that no appeal shall be allowed except to the supreme court.” Upon the question presented upon the present appeal, this seems to us to be conclusive. That question is whether, in proceedings before the municipal court under chapter 84, judgment of restitution can properly be rendered against the defendant simply upon his default, without proof of his case upon the part of the plaintiff. The statute provides, in unmistakable language, that “the proceedings shall be the same” in the municipal court as before a justice of the peace. We have seen that, before. the latter, the plaintiff, to entitle himself to judgment of restitution, must prove his case by the adduction of evidence, and cannot have such judgment simply upon the defendant’s default. The rule in the municipal court is the same.
Whatever presumptions the judgments of the municipal court of St. Paul may, in general, be entitled to, it affirmatively appears, from the clerk’s minutes in this case, that, defendant’s motion to dismiss having been denied, “thereupon, on motion of plaintiff’s attorney, the defendant, declining to answer, was by order of court duly defaulted, and judgment ordered by the court for plaintiff,” and that judgment was accordingly entered “pursuant” to such order. Any
Judgment reversed, and case remanded for a new trial.