Town of Durham v. Richmond & D.R. Co.

• Decision Date: 14 April 1891
• Citation: 13 S.E. 1,108 N.C. 399
• Parties: Town of Durham v. Richmond & D. R. Co.
• Court: North Carolina Supreme Court

13 S.E. 1

108 N.C. 399

Town of Durham v. Richmond & D. R. Co.

Supreme Court of North Carolina

April 14, 1891

For former report, see 12 S.E. Rep. 1040.

Where the successful party on appeal could have condensed his brief to 10 pages, for which number of pages he is permitted to tax costs by Sup.Ct.Rule 37, no costs will be allowed him for the excess.

Batchelor & Devereux, for appellant.

T. H Busbee, for appellee.

Clark J.

This is a motion by the appellant to retax the bill of costs in this court by allowing "the actual cost of printing the record and brief." Rule 29 requires the "case on appeal" to be printed, and such other parts of the record as may be necessary to present the exceptions made the designation of such other parts to be made by counsel of the appellant. If, however, more than 20 pages are printed the costs for the excess can only be allowed by order of the court, ^[1] for which purpose this motion is now made. An inspection of the transcript shows 74 pages printed. Of these, 68 pages are in the "case on appeal" settled by the judge. As this the appellant was required by the rules to have printed, and could not omit any part thereof, it is but just that he should be allowed for said 68 pages, deducting the 20 pages already taxed, to-wit, 48 pages additional at 60 cents per page. The other 6 pages were not embraced in the "case on appeal," presented no exceptions to be reviewed, and were unnecessarily printed. This case differs from Roberts v. Lewald, 12 S.E Rep. 1028, (at this term,) in which the case on appeal was only 2 pages, and, the winning party having been allowed the costs of printing 20 pages, further allowance was denied.

In this connection it is proper to note that the case seems to have been made up from the stenographer's notes, and, instead of making a brief of such evidence as was material, the entire transcript of the evidence seems to have been put into the case. This may save labor to the judge, but is an unnecessary expense to parties, and is not a "case settled," within the meaning of the statute. As the use of stenographers will become more common in our courts, the attention of the trial judges should be especially called to this, which is likely, if not adverted to, to become an evil and an oppression. It is not intended that the transcript of the "case on appeal" should become a dumping-ground for the entire evidence and minutiae of the trial below. The...