Page:The Green Bag (1889–1914), Volume 24.pdf/218

 The Appellate Autocrats how in the very nature of the case there could be or was any controversy on this question. And lastly in this same line was an intimation of "dispute and doubt" as to whether Simon Ordinary consented to having this strip stolen from him and the fence put up against his door! The only apparent excuse for this allwise conclusion appears to be self-con tradictory testimony of the defendant which was met by numerous witnesses, with the defendant impeaching himself before he got through testifying. However, these technical "doubts and disputes" furnished judicial technical reasons for the autocrats' eagle-eyed search for technical error for reversal, because the trial court had not thought of "submitting to the jury for decision" questions nobody at the trial thought there was any dispute about. The very nature of the situation would seem to preclude any idea of doubt about it anywhere outside of an appellate court room where technicality rules as the "lord of high decision." Nevertheless, that disposed of two of the three independent legal reasons on any one of which the judgment of the lower court in favor of Simon Ordi nary might have been sustained. The final reason, relating to adverse possession, remains to be considered. The statute law prescribed in effect that a title by adverse possession for twenty years without color of title, i.e., without written conveyance valid or void, ripens into an absolute title of ownership. It was conceded without "doubt or dispute," even by the appellate auto crats, that Simon Ordinary had been in possession of the four-foot strip for fifteen years, and that he and his imme diate predecessor or grantor had been in uninterrupted possession for more than the required twenty years.

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Young Lawyer Tryem contended that under the statute such twenty years' possession by Simon and his grantor, by tacking and without a paper or written transfer between them, estab lished absolute title and furnished a valid ground for affirmance of the judg ment. Mr. Stikatem, the experienced old technical lawyer of Captain Somebody, insisted that the statute contemplated twenty years' continuous possession by a single holder, or written conveyances between successive holders. The appellate court in its opinion on this point said : — "He (Simon Ordinary) also failed to show title by adverse possession. His possession was without color of title and falls short of the statutory period, while the fact that he had no written conveyance leaves him without aid from the prior possession of his predecessors in possession." That, of course, judicially settled the case of Ordinary v. Somebody, the judg ment of the lower court being reversed and the cause sent back for a new trial. As illustrating the infallibility and consistency of the appellate court, and furnishing the excuse, or lack of it, for the "concrete justice" meted out to Simon Ordinary, a few quotations on the identical point from the same court may be of interest. Seven or eight years before, the court said: — "There are doubtless instances where the successive possessions of different occupants have been regarded as a single continued possession, but we do not see how that can be held as to the excess here." A year prior to the fiat in Simon's case, the court held as follows: — "So, without a deed of the strip, it seems that the defendant can claim no