Hanson v. Kent & Purdy Paint Co.

• Decision Date: 19 November 1912
• Citation: Hanson v. Kent & Purdy Paint Co., 129 P. 7, 36 Okla. 583, 1912 OK 724 (Okla. 1912)
• Parties: HANSON ET AL. v. KENT & PURDY PAINT CO.
• Court: Oklahoma Supreme Court

129 P. 7

36 Okla. 583, 1912 OK 724

HANSON ET AL. v. KENT & PURDY PAINT CO.

Supreme Court of Oklahoma

November 19, 1912

Syllabus by the Court.

Where a party alleges error on account of the admission or rejection of evidence, but fails to set out in his brief the full substance of such evidence to the admission or rejection of which he objects, stating specifically his objection thereto the same will not be reviewed on appeal.

"Instructions" are directions in reference to the law of the case, enabling the jury to better understand their duty, and prevent them from arriving at an erroneous and wrong conclusion.

Instructions covering 20 pages of the record, in a case where the issues are few and simple, are open to serious criticism, as being too long, tedious, vague, and indefinite. Instructions should be plain, simple, concise, unambiguous, and consistent.

Instructions examined, and held to be open to criticism, but not to such extent as would warrant an interference with the judgment.

Commissioners' Opinion. Division No. 1. Error from District Court, Oklahoma County; John J. Carney, Judge.

Action by the Kent & Purdy Paint Company against S.E. Hanson and another for a money judgment on account. Judgment for plaintiff, and defendants bring error. Affirmed.

W. K Snyder, of Oklahoma City, for plaintiffs in error.

Oliver C. Black, of Oklahoma City, for defendant in error.

ROBERTSON C.

Counsel for plaintiffs in error urge four assignments of error as grounds for reversal in this case; the first being error of the trial court in excluding testimony offered by plaintiffs in error relative to an alleged collateral agreement between plaintiff in error S.E. Hanson and defendant in error, the same being a part of the entire transaction between said plaintiff in error, S.E. Hanson, and defendant in error, and to the effect that said S.E. Hanson, under his contract with defendant in error, could make sales on credit and make due report of said sales on credit, the manner of reporting said sales on credit to defendant in error being prescribed by said defendant in error, its agent or employé. Objection is made by defendant in error to the consideration of this assignment of error by the court, for that it is not saved and presented in the manner and form required by the rules of this court. This objection is well taken and should be sustained. It has been repeatedly held by this court that where a party alleges error on account of the admission or rejection of evidence, but fails to set out in his brief the full substance of such evidence to the admission or rejection of which he objects, stating specifically his objection thereto, the same will not be reviewed on appeal. Ward v Richards, 28 Okl. 629, 115 P. 791; Terrapin v Barker, 26 Okl. 93, 109 P. 931; Lynn v. Jackson, 26 Okl. 852, 110 P. 727; Great Western Mfg. Co. v. Davidson Mill & Elev. Co., 26 Okl. 626, 110 P. 1096.

Consideration of the second and third assignments of error has been waived by plaintiff in error, and the same will not receive further consideration at our hands.

The only question presented by this record is that found in the fourth assignment of error, and deals with the instructions given by the court to the jury in this case. Counsel for plaintiffs in error charge that the trial court in this case has "violated every known canon governing the instructing of juries; that the instructions are not plain; that they are not clear; that they are not simple; that they are not concise; that they are ambiguous; that they are contradictory; and that they are inconsistent, misleading, and mutually exclusive and destructive to such a degree that not even a Philadelphia lawyer, much less the ordinary man who sits on a jury, could tell from these instructions what the law was governing this case."

The above, it must be admitted, is a pretty severe criticism of the...