13 Haw. 702 | Haw. | 1901
OPINION OF THE COURT BY
The plaintiff filed an action of assumpsit in the District Court of South Hilo, Island of Hawaii, for the recovery of $96.00 alleged to be due from the defendants as rental for certain buildings held by them under lease. On the return day the parties appeared in court and the defendants’ attorney moved thg ppurt, as appears from the certificate of the District Magis
At the hearing in this court the defendants’ attorneys presented and argued a motion to dismiss the appeal, (1) that no points of law were certified in the certificate of the District Magistrate as required by the Rules of Court, (2) that the order appealed from was not a final order and not appealable.
The statute permits appeals to be taken from the decision of the District Magistrate directly to the Supreme Court when .such appeal is taken only on points of law (Sec. 1430, Civil Laws). Rule 5 of this Court prescribes that when the appeal is taken and perfected the District Magistrate “shall forward without delay to the clerk of the Supreme Court a certificate' of appeal, stating the nature of the action, the decision made, and the points of law upon which the appeal is taken.” * * * In so far as this rule may be said to be a limitation on the right to an appeal given by statute it should receive a liberal interpretation.
While the certificate does not set out clearly the points of law relied on by the appellant in as much as they do appear from the certificate we think it ought to be held sufficient. This view finds support in Titcomb v. Naeole, 10 Haw., 346.
Was the order made in this case appealable? It has been held by this Court that an appeal lies from an order declining to set aside a judgment where a substantial right is involved, and the judgment is clearly void as a matter of law. Gouveia v. Nakamura, ante, p. 452. It has also been held that where a
It was said by the Court in Barthrop v. Kona Coffee Co., 10 Haw., 400, that a final decision for the purposes of an appeal was not necessarily the last decision in a case; that “the effect of a decision would seem to be a better test of its finality than the stage at which it was rendered.” This we deem the true test of an appealable order.
We are of the opinion that when the Magistrate continued the cause until another proceeding in another court was terminated — an indefinite and uncertain time — -that this was equiv
The motion to dismiss the appeal is denied and the cause is remanded to the District Magistrate of South Hilo, with direction to set aside the order of continuance appealed from and for such further proceedings as may be necessary»