Gupton, In re

Citation77 S.E.2d 716,238 N.C. 303
Decision Date30 September 1953
Docket NumberNo. 106,106
CourtUnited States State Supreme Court of North Carolina
PartiesIn re GUPTON.

T. A. Burgess, Rocky Mount, and Yarborough & Yarborough, Louisburg, for petitioner, appellant.

W. O. Rosser, Whitaker, for respondent, appellee.

ERVIN, Justice.

The law of the land clause embodied in Article I, Section 17, of the North Carolina Constitution guarantees to the litigant in every kind of judicial proceeding the right to an adequate and fair hearing before he can be deprived of his claim or defense by judicial decree. Eason v. Spence, 232 N.C. 579, 61 S.E.2d 717; National Surety Corp. v. Sharpe, 232 N.C. 98, 59 S.E.2d 593.

Where the claim or defense turns upon a factual adjudication, the constitutional right of the litigant to an adequate and fair hearing requires that he be apprised of all the evidence received by the court and given an opportunity to test, explain, or rebut it. In re Edwards' Estate, 234 N.C. 202, 66 S.E.2d 675; State v. Gordon, 225 N.C. 241, 34 S.E.2d 414; Interstate Commerce Commission v. Louisville & N. R. Co., 227 U.S. 88, 33 S.Ct. 185, 57 L.Ed. 431.

The judgment sets at naught the petitioner's constitutional right to an adequate and fair hearing. It deprives him of his claim to the custody of his daughter upon a factual adjudication based in substantion part upon evidence of an unrevealed nature gathered by the presiding judge in secret from undisclosed sources without his knowledge or that of his counsel.

The judgment is set aside and the proceeding is remanded to the Superior Court of Nash County to the end that it may be heard anew agreeably to the law of the land.

Error and remanded.

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25 cases
  • In re C.G.
    • United States
    • Court of Appeal of North Carolina (US)
    • July 20, 2021
    ...be apprised of all the evidence received by the court and given an opportunity to test, explain, or rebut it. " In re Gupton , 238 N.C. 303, 304-05, 77 S.E.2d 716, 717-18 (1953) (emphasis added) (citations omitted); see also State v. Gordon , 225 N.C. 241, 246, 34 S.E.2d 414, 416 (1945) (" ......
  • Moore's Sterilization, In re
    • United States
    • United States State Supreme Court of North Carolina
    • January 29, 1976
    ...of procedural due process. Buck v. Bell, supra; Hagins v. Redevelopment Comm., 275 N.C. 90, 165 S.E.2d 490 (1969); In Re Custody of Gupton, 238 N.C. 303, 77 S.E.2d 716 (1953); Brewer v. Valk, Respondent further contends that the statutes in question deny him substantive due process. 'Due pr......
  • In re C.G.
    • United States
    • Court of Appeal of North Carolina (US)
    • July 20, 2021
    ...to test, explain, or rebut it[, ]" in accordance with his constitutional right to a full and fair hearing on the facts. Gupton, 238 N.C. at 304-05, 77 S.E.2d at 717-18. Instead, the trial court unilaterally offered the reports evidence in the State's stead, admitted them as evidence, and pr......
  • Alamance County Court Facilities, Matter of, No. 191A89
    • United States
    • United States State Supreme Court of North Carolina
    • June 12, 1991
    ...right to an adequate and fair hearing before he can be deprived of his claim or defense by judicial decree." In re Custody of Gupton, 238 N.C. 303, 304, 77 S.E.2d 716, 717 (1953). "The instant that the court perceives that it is exercising, or is about to exercise, a forbidden or ungranted ......
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