Hunter v. Forsyth

Citations

• 205 Pa. 466
• 55 A. 26
• 1903 Pa. LEXIS 596

Syllabus

<p>Affidavit of defense — Judgment—Opening judgment.</p> <p>When an affidavit of defense is filed and its sufficiency is in question, the court must accept it for verity and regard all the facts properly set forth in it as proved. But where the affidavit is not filed in time, and comes before the court only on a rule to open a judgment regularly entered, the court is entitled to examine the averments critically and to require further evidence as to the facts, as in other cases of application to open judgments.</p> <p>Where in an action on a promissory note judgment was entered for want of an affidavit of defense being filed in time, and defendant procures a rule to open the judgment, and presents the affidavit of defense which he had prepared to file, and this paper is vague and uncertain in its terms, the court will refuse to open the judgment in the absence of depositions or other proof.</p> <p>Promissory notes — Revenue stamps — Affidavit of defense.</p> <p>In an action upon a promissory note, an averment in the affidavit of defense that “ it does not appear from the plaintiff’s statement of claim that the note was stamped,” is merely an argumentative denial, and is not equivalent to a direct statement that the note was not duly stamped. Such an averment amounts at most to a technical objection to the pleadings, which is not the office of either an affidavit of defense or an affidavit to open a judgment.</p> <p>Not decided whether an act of congress prohibiting the admission in evidence “ in any court” of an-unstamped paper applies to state as well as federal courts.</p>