4 Denio 182 | N.Y. Sup. Ct. | 1847
The language of the return favors the objection, that the justice did not wait an hour for the defendant after the time specified for the return of the summons, before he proceeded with the cause. (2 R. S. 233, § 46.) But that is not the necessary and unavoidable inference from the words of the return. It states that the plaintiffs ap peared “at the time;” and that the defendant did not appear; and then, commencing with a new period, it adds, that the plaintiffs declared. It is quite possible that the declaration did not follow immediately; and that a whole hour elapsed before it was received. It is not improbable that such was the fact; and that the reason why the delay was not mentioned in the return is, that nothing was said on the subject in the affidavit, which was served on the justice. The legal presumption is in favor of the proper discharge of official duty; and we must intend that the proceedings were regular, until the contrary plainly appears. (Fuller v. Wilcox, 19 Wend. 351; Oakley v. Van Horn, 21 id. 305; Baum v. Tarpenny, 3 Hill, 75.) If this matter was mentioned in the defendant’s affidavit on which the certiorari was allowed, he should have insisted on a return stating expressly whether the justice waited an hour or not.
There is the more reason to believe that this question was not mentioned in the defendant’s affidavit, nor thought of by the justice, because in a very good brief submitted on the part of the plaintiffs, the point is not even mentioned. It has probably been started here for the first time. But it is enough that it does not expressly appear that the defendant was deprived of his hour of grace.
The defendant insists that the judgment must be reversed
The plaintiffs gave sufficient evidence of their demand to warrant the justice in rendering judgment in their favor.
Judgment affirmed.