6 N.Y.S. 554 | The Superior Court of the City of New York and Buffalo | 1889
This is an appeal from a judgment of the municipal court for $28, in favor of the plaintiff, and against the defendant. It appears from the return that the plaintiff leased to the defendant certain premises on Broadway, for the term of four years and eight months from September 1, 1885. The defendant occupied the premises up to July 31, 1888, at which time he was owing the plaintiff for rent $116. He gave him a check for $80, and agreed to make a suit of clothes worth $28, and pay $2 in cash, in full settlement of the rent. On the 2d of August following the plaintiff, without making any other agreement as to the payment of the rent then due, signed an agreement terminating the lease, containing this clause: “ Without claims,
The other point raised by the defendant I do not think is well taken. After the trial of the action had been commenced, the plaintiff asked leave to amend his complaint by alleging the facts as they appear from the evidence. It does not occur to me that it was necessary to amend his complaint to entitle him to recover. The action was for rent, and whether the defendant had agreed to pay it by making a suit of clothes for a part does not seem to be very important. At all events the court had ample authority to allow the pleadings to bq amended. The practice in justice’s courts has always favored great latitude in allowing amendments to pleadings. They are often mere verbal statements of a party’s claim, made without the interposition of an attorney, and are frequently carelessly and imperfectly taken by the justice; and the practice, as it existed before the Code, was to allow the parties to amend whenever substantial justice would be promoted. Code Civil Proc. § 2944, seems to make it mandatory upon the court to allow the pleadings to be amended at any time before the trial, or during the trial, or upon appeal, if substantial justice will be promoted thereby. Vaughn v. Lego, 1 N. Y. Supp. 689. The judge acted within the scope of his authority, and I do not think error was committed. The other points raised by the defendant relating to the admission of evidence are all necessarily disposed of in the discussion of the first proposition, and need no further attention. I think no error was committed, and the judgment should be affirmed, with costs. All concur.