Patterson v. Hopkins
| Decision Date | 26 October 1871 |
| Court | Michigan Supreme Court |
| Parties | Lucius Patterson v. Hannibal A. Hopkins and others |
Heard October 25, 1871
Appeal in chancery from Kent circuit.
Motion to dismiss the appeal on the ground that the degree appealed from was not a final decree.
Appeal dismissed.
D Darwin Hughes, for the motion.
Charles I. Walker, contra.
The motion to dismiss this appeal rests on the claim that the decree is not final, but interlocutory. The difficulty which has arisen in determining its character, arises out of the fact that it purports to declare and regulate in advance, all or nearly all imaginable action that may be expected to be taken in the future disposition of the case. It declares the principles upon which the commissioner and the court are expected to act throughout.
But, in spite of all this, it really adjudicates nothing capable of being carried into effect without further inquiry as to the rights and liabilities of the parties. It declares that the complainant ought to have a specific performance but it does not fix the terms nor direct either party to act. In order to ascertain what shall be fixed as the specific action to be had by each, it orders a reference involving a multitude of nice and complicated inquiries, including first, an inquiry into the rents received, the rental value, and the damages for waste or otherwise done or incurred during a possession wrongfully taken away from a receiver in the cause; second, an inquiry into liens and incumbrances, and into the state of the title third, the state of the accounts after allowing and applying the sums estimated on the other inquiries. And in addition to these references, the decree goes on to require that upon or after various periods from the confirmation of the report, the defendants or the receiver shall pay off the incumbrances reported to exist, and in case the sums they should pay exceed what they may be entitled to receive on the contract, that they pay that excess or stand in contempt.
But every matter which legitimately belongs to a final decree is left to be determined. There is no adjudication whether any and if so what, title will be found to exist to be conveyed; nor how much money is to be paid by either party to the other on the specific performance. All this is to be ascertained hereafter by proof. Upon the reference all these important controversies are yet to be...
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Wells v. Shriver
...of inserting in orders preliminary directions and abstract rulings on future contingencies criticized as leading to confusion." Patterson v. Hopkins, 23 Mich. 541. ¶21 We will now consider some of the leading authorities which appear to support the contentions of the defendant. "Where there......
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Wells v. Shriver
...of inserting in orders preliminary directions and abstract rulings on future contingencies condemned as leading to confusion." Patterson v. Hopkins, 23 Mich. 541. We now consider some of the leading authorities which appear to support the contentions of the defendant: "Where there are two o......
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Wurzer v. Geraldine
...decrees which are otherwise final.' 1 Freeman on Judgments, par. 37. 4. Defendants rely upon Perkins v. Perkins, 16 Mich. 162;Patterson v. Hopkins, 23 Mich. 541;Brown v. Thompson, 29 Mich. 72; and Ritzer v. Ritzer, 243 Mich. 406, 220 N. W. 812, to show the decree in question is interlocutor......
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McAuslan v. McAuslan
...case." Such decrees "have no efficacy until put into the form of a judgment that is capable of being carried into execution." Patterson v. Hopkins, 23 Mich. 541. A decree which directed a trustee to sell mortgaged property as the court might afterwards direct, and referred the cause to a ma......