In re Stewart
Lаnds limited over were sold in this matter, and the life tenant, being the administrаtrix of the person who died seized, applies by petition to have certain moneys tolled out of the proceеds of sale to reimburse her for debts of the decedent paid by her, making the remaindermen respondents.
The petition is signed by two solicitor’s in their individual names, and both their names are endorsed upon the back of the petition. They are not partners. This is irregular. It is a practice quite too often resorted to and must be stopped. No party litigant can have two solicitors or attorneys of record. The
It seems to have taken a statute to permit attorneys or solicitors, who аre partners, to practice in their partnership namеs. The Practice act provides that “attorneys who arе partners may, in their partnership name, appear аnd prosecute or defend any action in any court of this state.” Comp. Stat. p. 4053, § 1. Mr. Dickinson, in his Chancery Precedents, refers to this statute as authority for solicitors, who are partners, to appeаr and prosecute or defend. Dick. Ch. Prec. (rev. ed.) 281 note a.
The term “attorney of record” is well known. It is mentioned in 2 Cyc. 12, 867. The term “solicitor in chancery” is equаlly well known in England and in this state. The rules of the court of chancеry make frequent reference to a solicitor of a party, but not to the solicitors of a party. The sаme may be said of the rules of the supreme court as to attorneys-at-law.
A party litigant may have a number of counsel tо advise him, and to actually participate in a trial as his rеpresentatives, but he can have only one attorney or solicitor of record, who may be an individual рractitioner, or a firm of practitioners, who, as such, are regarded as a single entity.
In Weeks on Attorneys (2d ed.), it is laid down, in section 220 (at p. 458) :
‘■One who appears only as counsel in a case is not authorized to sign a stipulation for а continuance, even if he be an attorney and counsеlor of the court in which the suit is pending. The conduct of a suit, except in a matter arising in the argument or hearing before the court, is exclusively under the control of the attorney of record in it. Whatever interest other counsel may have in the event of the suit, or the subject-matter of it, they are virtually strangers to the record.”