27 N.C. 187 | N.C. | 1844
This case was before this Court at the last term, Moore v. Gwynn,
Under the charge of the court the jury found a verdict for the plaintiff, and judgment being rendered accordingly, the defendant appealed.
Our only inquiry is as to the legal correctness of the charge. Was his Honor correct in stating to the jury that they were to be instructed by the court what the law of Virginia was, and in stating to them what was that law? In other words, was it a question of law for the decision of the court, or one of fact for the determination of the jury? We think that his Honor erred, and that it ought to have been left to the jury as a question of fact. The case does (190) not arise under any statute of Virginia, but under the common law of that State. And we are scarcely at liberty at this day to consider the question as an open one. Repeated decisions of this Court have settled it. In Knight v. Wall
We do not mean to say that when a case arises under a statute of a sister State it is not the province of the court to decide both the existence of the statute and its proper construction. In such a case, the statute being authenticated in the manner pointed out by the Constitution of the United States and the act of Congress, both the fact of its existence and its proper construction is matter for the court. So, also, when the existence of such a statute is proved in the manner directed by the act of our Assembly, to the satisfaction of the jury, its exposition belongs to the court as entirely, in both the last cases, as if it were a statute of our own State. To the cases already cited from our own Reports as sustaining the view we have taken of the question involved in this case may be added Brockett v. Norton,
PER CURIAM. Venire de novo.
Cited: Hooper v. Moore,
(192)