Wade v. Odeneal
| Decision Date | 31 December 1832 |
| Citation | 14 N.C. 423 |
| Court | North Carolina Supreme Court |
| Parties | JOHN WADE v. JOHN ODENEAL. |
The records of a court cannot be explained by parol testimony.
THIS was an action of debt, upon the Act of 1774 (Rev., ch. 105), directing the duty of sheriffs with respect to insolvent taxables, and imposing a penalty of £20 for collecting taxes of one whom the sheriff has returned an insolvent.
The cause was tried before Martin, J., at ROCKINGHAM, on the last circuit, when, upon nil debet pleaded, the clerk of the county court produced a list of the insolvent taxables in the handwriting of the defendant, the sheriff of Rockingham, in which was the name of the plaintiff. The list was endorsed "allowed'' and the clerk swore that no other order was ever made by the county court concerning the insolvents of that year, and that the defendant had settled the county taxes by that list.
The defendant objected to the clerk's giving any parol evidence, but the objection was overruled, and a verdict being returned for the plaintiff, the defendant appealed.
The Acts of 1774 (Rev., ch. 105) and 1786 (Rev., ch. 255, sec. 2), and all the subsequent statutes providing for a credit to sheriffs for insolvents, refer to an allowance to him of them inthe first instance by the county court. This was provided for by the two old statutes of 1760, ch. 2, and 1768, ch. 6. Down to this time the sheriff passes his list of insolvents at the treasury only upon the authority of the order of his county court at home, specifying each insolvent, and the amount of the whole. The mischief intended to be remedied by the Act of 1774, under which this action is brought, is that of the sheriff collecting, and putting in his private purse, moneys which he had not paid, and was not liable to pay, into the treasury. Unless, therefore, an order be passed by the court which would exonerate the sheriff from accountability for these taxes, the case has not arisen in which he incurs a penalty for collecting them, because they remain due to the public. The order or judgment of the court is the efficient protection both to him and the taxables.
The question is, How is this judgment to be proved? Courts of record speak only in their records. They preserve written memorials of their proceedings, which are exclusively the evidence of those proceedings. If they choose to keep minutes, which they understand and can act on to their own satisfaction, it is well. If from them they can afterwards undertake to draw out the record to...
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Norfolk Southern R. Co. v. Reid
...but their contents cannot be altered, nor their meaning explained by parol. The acts of the court cannot thus be established." Wade v. Odeneal, 14 N.C. 423. conclusion, we think, is sustained by several decisions. Cline v. Lemon, 4 N. C. 323; Spencer v. Cohoon, 18 N.C. 27; Galloway v. McKei......
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New Farley Nat. Bank v. Montgomery County
...other courts can receive of its proceedings, whether it is of the exercise of judicial or of mere ministerial authority and duty. Wade v. Odeneal, 14 N.C. 423; Franklin County v. Richardson (Sup.) 79 So. 384. indorsing the principle above announced, Chief Justice Brickell, in the case of Sp......
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State v. Tola
...to evidence, is better settled, than that parol testimony in contradiction of matters of record is inadmissible." Again, in Wade v. Odeneal, 14 N.C. 423, Ruffin, J., said: "The question is, how this judgment to be proved. Courts of record speak only in their records. They preserve written m......
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Franklin County v. Richardson
...764; City of Birmingham v. Chestnutt, 161 Ala. 253, 49 So. 813; Perryman v. Greenville, 51 Ala. 507; Mobile Co. v. Maddox, supra; Wade v. Odeneal, 14 N.C. 423. In parte Bradshaw, 174 Ala. 243, 245, 250, 57 So. 16, Mr. Justice Somerville said: "As said by Mr. Freeman: 'All courts and all tri......