McKinnon v. Lewis

Citations

• 60 Fla. 125

Syllabus

<p>1. The primary object of a writ of error is not to try the issues between the parties but rather to try the judgment rendered by the court below, to test the judgment by the law.</p> <p>2. Upon a writ of error, the respective parties litigant are presumed to have had their day in court and to have had the points at issue between them fairly and impartially tried and determined in accordance with the law of the land. The final judgment rendered in the trial court is presumed to be correct, and this presumption must be met in the appellate court and overcome by the plaintiff in error.</p> <p>S. Upon a writ of error, the plaintiff in error becomes the actor in the appellate court, whether he occupied the position of plaintiff or defendant in the court below, and upon him rests the burden. It is incumbent upon him to show that the different rulings of the trial court of which he complains, or some of them, are so infected with error as to call for and compel a reversal of the judgment. The mere fact that technical error was committed by the trial court in some of its rulings may not be sufficient; the errors must have been harmful or prejudicial to the rights of the plaintiff in error.</p> <p>4. A writ of error brings to the appellate court for review the different rulings made by the trial court, whether upon the pleadings or during the trial of the action, upon which errors have been properly assigned.</p> <p>5. It is the duty of a party resorting to an appellate court to make the errors complained of clearly to appear, if they in truth exist, every presumption being in favor of the respective rulings of the trial court.</p> <p>6. In preparing assignments of error, each error relied upon, should be clearly and distinctly specified and separately assigned.</p> <p>V. A single assignment of error attacking a plurality of rulings of the trial court, whether upon the pleadings, the admission or rejection of evidence, or the giving or refusing of instructions to the jury