Page:The Green Bag (1889–1914), Volume 25.pdf/511

 482

The Green Bag

India, Australia, and Canada, these rights have been abrogated. And the single exception is that of the province of South Africa or Cape of Good Hope, and here trouble and litigation is already being had as the result." Witchcraft. "Scottish Witch Trials: I, The Witches of North Berwick." 25 Juridical Review 161. An interesting account of prosecutions for witchcraft in King James's reign. "He found the sport congenial; it combined at once amuse ment and instruction, ministering as it did both to his cruelty and vainglory, with him two very powerful passions." Workmen's Compensation. ' ' In What Spirit Should the Liability Laws be Received?" By Axel Teisen. 77 Central Law Journal 39 (July 18). "It becomes not only to the interest of society

at large, nay, it becomes the duty of society, or of the state, to protect both employer and employee against ruin by these unavoidable inci dents to their business. In the carrying out of this thought, great variation may be found, but two distinct types may be marked. In England and America we have Employers' Liability Acts or Workingmen's Compensation Acts, while on the continent we find Workingmen's Insurance Acts. The names do not make much differ ence, but in the names is hidden a difference in principle. The English and American acts, owing to the peculiarities of the law prior to them, have been looked upon as a special legis lation intended to be in favor of the employees and, therefore, as directed against and inimical to the employer. In Europe, it has always been clearly understood that the insurance acts were meant and intended to, and did actually, work for the benefit of both employee, employer and society at large."

Latest Important Appellate Procedure. Error of Form Rather than Substance in the Complaint — Appeal Based on Technicality Denied. N. M. In Canavan v. Canavan, 131 Pac. Rep. 194, decided by the Supreme Court of New Mexico, the action was for divorce. Complainant had failed to allege the residence necessary to give the trial court jurisdiction. Defendant, instead of demurring, which would have led to an amend ment, appears to have relied on a loophole of technical error as a means of escape. Defendant, at all events, raised the issue of jurisdiction in the Supreme Court. The evidence clearly and without controversy showed residence for the required period. The Court denied the appeal, presumably recognizing the existence of the statute requiring that all omissions, defects etc., not against the right and justice of the matter of the action, shall "be supplied and amended by the court where the judgment shall be given or by the court into which the judgment shall be removed by writ of error or appeal." Trial by Jury —. Massachusetts Constitution Does Not Guarantee Right to a Second Jury Trial of the Same Controversy. Mass. The Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, mBothwell v. Boston Elevated Ry., 102 N. E. Rep. 665, held that St. 1909, c. 236, of Massachusetts, does not invalidate Bill of Rights, art. 15, pro viding that in all controversies concerning prop erty, and in all suits between two or more persons, except in cases in which it had heretofore been

Cases

otherwise used and practised, the parties have a right to a trial by jury, and that this method of procedure shall be held sacred except where the Legislature, in certain cases specified, shall alter it. The statute thus upheld applies to civil cases where a request that on all the evidence a finding or verdict be returned for either party has been denied at the trial, and a finding or verdict has been rendered contrary thereto. In such in stances, the statute directs that if it shall be held by the Supreme Judicial Court on excep tions that the request should have been granted and if all exceptions by the prevailing party shall be overruled, this court may direct the entry of judgment for the party in whose behalf the request was made and erroneously refused. We quote from the New York Law Journal (editorial, Oct. 7, 1913): "The learned Chief Justice [Rugg] notes that Slocum v. N. Y. Life Ins. Co., [228 U. S. 364, see 25 Green Bag 274] holds that 'the right of trial by jury' secured by the seventh amendment of the Constitution of the United States 'does not permit the entry after a verdict in favor of one party, of a judg ment for the opposing party under circumstances like those in the case at bar.' . . . The func tion of the jury is to pass upon the facts involved in an action. The statute now under review does not infringe upon this province in any degree. A trial judge always has had power to direct a verdict provided the law required it.