Graves v. Bonness

• Decision Date: 16 February 1906
• Citation: 107 N.W. 163,97 Minn. 278
• Parties: GRAVES v. BONNESS.
• Court: Minnesota Supreme Court

97 Minn. 278

107 N.W. 163

GRAVES

v.BONNESS.

Supreme Court of Minnesota.

Feb. 16, 1906.

Appeal from District Court, Hennepin County; David F. Simpson, Judge.

Action by Carlton Graves against Frederick W. Bonnes. Verdict for plaintiff. From an order denying a new trial, defendant appeals. Affirmed.

Syllabus by the Court

When an objection to the admission of evidence is so general as not to indicate the specific grounds upon which it is made, it is unavailing on appeal, unless it be of such a character that it could not have been obviated.

Whenever the objection that no sufficient foundation is laid clearly results in the reasonable and natural misdirection of the attention of the trial court and of opposing counsel to only certain of a larger number of possible phases of preliminary proof, and in a correct ruling thereon, an appellate court will not reverse a cause because of failure of preliminary proof upon different phases, in the absence of any reason why that proof might not have been supplied.

In this case the objection of no foundation laid to the admission of a letter was reasonably understood by the court and opposing counsel to refer to lack of the authority of the agent writing that letter to bind his principal by it. After trial the point was raised, for the first time, that there was no evidence that the letter had ever been mailed, or sent to, or received by the plaintiff. The letter, produced by the plaintiff, referred to previous communications between the parties. Plaintiff was in court, apparently able to prove mailing and receipt. Under such circumstances a verdict for the plaintiff will not be set aside because of insufficient foundation for the admission of that letter.

The verdict is held justified by the evidence, and the calculation of its amount reasonable, in view of the testimony as to the terms of a contract and as to its performance.

The trial court did not abuse its discretion in holding that certain remarks of counsel for the plaintiff to the jury did not work such prejudice as to constitute reversible error. Elliott, J., dissenting. H. B. Fryberger and Brown & Kerr, for appellant.

F. E. Ebner, for respondent.

JAGGARD, J.

This was an action brought to recover payment for three seasons' cut of saw logs, delivered by the plaintiff and respondent to defendant and appellant. Plaintiff demanded judgment for $73,842.73. The answer prayed the judgment of the court that the plaintiff recover against the defendant the sum of $584.62, and no more. The main issue tried to a jury concerned the contract between the parties. The jury brought in a verdict of $37,827.23. From an order of the district court denying defendant's motion for a new trial, this appeal was taken.

1. The principal assignment of error was addressed to a ruling on the part of the trial court in receiving in evidence a letter of defendant's bookkeeper, Rosche, to the plaintiff. For present purposes, it is conceded that, if the objection to the offer of this letter was sufficient, the case must be reversed, and that Exhibit 3 was originally offered in evidence after defendant had, on cross-examination by plaintiff, testified as to Rosche's charge of the business, when the defendant was away, and as to his connection with the firm correspondence. The objection was on the ground ‘that it is incompetent, irrelevant, and immaterial, and no foundation laid.’ The court then sustained the objection at that time on the ground of insufficient foundation. Subsequently the deposition of Rosche, the writer of the letter, was introduced, inter alia. It strongly tended to show Rosche's authority to write the letter for defendant. The record of its final admission in evidence is as follows: ‘Mr. Barker: Now, Exhibit 3 is not in, I believe. That has been offered, and it was refused at that time. It seems to me that at the present time this exhibit is perfectly proper. I will offer it again. Mr. Brown: Objected to upon the ground it is incompetent, irrelevant, immaterial, and no foundation laid. The Court: The objection is overruled. I think the testimony in the deposition since this letter was offered would make the letter competent.’

It is obvious that the point, and the only point, to which the attention of the court and of opposing counsel was in fact directed, was the authority of Rosche, as agent for the defendant, to write the letter. In the brief of counsel for defendant in this court it is said: ‘The remark of the court concerning the admissibility of the letter (which has just been quoted) would seem to indicate that he had in his mind at that time only one phase of the matter, so far as the foundation for the letter was concerned, and that he ruled upon the objection to it without sufficiently considering all of the reasons against its reception presented by the objection to its competency.’ It was not the province of the trial court to see that counsel offering evidence had rendered that evidence competent for admission by laying sufficient foundation, or that objecting counsel had formulated an appropriate and specific objection; but to rule upon the objections as reasonably and fairly interpreted in the light of the immediate circumstances. When the court and opposing counsel, as in this case, are clearly misled by the ambiguous character of the objections in connection with the previous course of the testimony, it is not material whether the objecting counsel deliberately tried to ‘draw the wool over the court's eyes,’ or resorted to the dialectical strategy of a masked battery, or allowed the point to escape him. A reversal in an appellate court because of error in a consequent ruling by the trial court will not reward such deceit, sharp practice, or inadvertence. There is nothing in this record, however, which imputes bad faith to the objecting counsel. It fairly appears from the record that the point now made was not in mind at the time the objection was interposed. However, they waived the point that plaintiff's counsel failed to show delivery of the letter, alike whether that point did not suggest itself to them or whether they saw it, but were silent because the plaintiff, who produced the letter, which on its face purported to be in answer to previous correspondence between the parties, was in court apparently able to supply the missing link. In any view of the case the defendant cannot now be heard to complain of the admission of the letter in evidence, because of their omission in fact to interpose a correct and specific objection.

This conclusion is fully sustained by authorities, general and specific. ‘A party objecting to the introduction of evidence must state his point so definitely that the court may intelligently rule upon it and the opposing party may, if the case admit of it, remove the objections by other evidence.’ Gilfillan, C. J., in Gilbert v. Thompson, 14 Minn. 544 (Gil. 414, 416). And see U. S. v. McMasters, 4 Wall. 680, 18 L. Ed. 311;Burton v. Driggs, 20 Wall. 125, 22 L. Ed. 299;Wood v. Weimar, 104 U. S. 795,26 L. Ed. 779. ‘The rule is universal that, when an objection is so general as not to indicate the specific grounds upon which it is made, it is unavailing on appeal, unless it be of such a character that it could not have been obviated.’ Mr. Justice Field in Noonan v. Caledonia Gold Min. Co., 7 Sup. Ct. 911, 30 L. Ed. 1061. And see cases collected 8 Enc. Plead. & Prac. 218. This ‘cardinal principle, no sooner repeated by the courts than it is forgotten by counsel’ (1 Wigmore on Ev. § 18), has been applied with unwavering rigidity in uncounted hundreds of cases to the permutations and combinations of the conventional words ‘incompetent,’ ‘irrelevant,’ and ‘immaterial.’ 46 Cent.Dig. cols. 944 to 967, §§ 194, 211; 4 Current Law, p. 1392, § 8. It has been reiterated time after time by this court. Califf v. Hill House, 3 Minn. 311 (Gil. 217); Schwartz v. Germ. Life Ins. Co., 21 Minn. 215;Craig v. Cook, 28 Minn. 236,9 N. W. 712;Stillman v. Railway Co., 34 Minn. 420, 26 N. W. 399;McDonald v. Peacock, 37 Minn. 514,35 N. W. 370;Bromberg v. Minn. Fire Ass'n, 45 Minn. 318, 47 N. W. 975;Triggs v. Jones, 46 Minn. 277, 280, 48 N. W. 1113;Thompson v. Ellenz, 58 Minn. 307,59 N. W. 1023;Hall v. Ins. Co., 76 Minn. 408,79 N. W. 497. And see cases collected in Dunnell Prac. §§ 1813-1815. The almost unanimous concurrence of all these cases in an emphatic refusal to treat as reversible error the admission of evidence upon an objection not clear and specific enough to point out to the court exactly what question was raised shows how unjustified are the current criticisms that American appellate courts rule on such questions to sustain or reverse the trial courts because of convictions as to the merits of the case, or for other reasons which they are unwilling or unable to express; and that American courts, to a deplorable extent, avoid verdicts for trivial violations of merely technical requirements of the rules of evidence which are unknown in other common-law countries.

The reasoning of the law in this connection is admirably set forth by Dunne, C. J.: ‘The object of requiring the grounds of objections to be stated, which may seem to be a technicality, is really to avoid technicalities and prevent delay in the administration of justice. When evidence is offered to which there is some objection, substantial justice requires that the objection be specified, so that the party offering the evidence can remove it, if possible, and let the case be tried on its merits. If it is objected that the question is leading, the form may be changed; if that the evidence is irrelevant, the relevancy may be shown; if that it is incompetent, the incompetency may be removed; if that it is immaterial, its materiality may be established; if to the order of introduction, it may be withdrawn and offered at another time-and thus appeals could often be saved, delays avoided, and substantial justice administered. Counsel...