Litigant

“ We do not doubt power in a proper case to issue such writs. But they have the unfortunate consequence of making the judge a litigant, obliged to obtain personal counsel or to leave his defense to one of the litigants before him. ”

“ When a litigant hires a lawyer who has a state license to practice, he certainly has no reason to suspect that the State will reach into his pocket and make him pay money or take away his valuable cause of action because of his lawyer's neglect. ”

“ Of course, any civilized system of judicial administration should have enough looseness in the joints to avert gross denials of a litigant's rights growing out of his lawyer's mistake or even negligence in failing to file the proper kind of pleading at precisely the prescribed moment. ”

“ Toward this end, § 1915 (a) allows a litigant to commence a civil or criminal action in federal court in forma pauperis by filing in good faith an affidavit stating, inter alia, that he is unable to pay the costs of the lawsuit. Congress recognized, however, that a litigant whose filing fees and court costs are assumed by the public, unlike a paying litigant, lacks an economic incentive to refrain from filing frivolous, malicious, or repetitive lawsuits. ”

“ A. Not invariably, because a litigant may have odd views about the importance of evidence and the time of professional advisers.
Q. When a litigant is afflicted with this lack of knowledge what is the customary result?
A. That the defendants have to undergo the expense of a several-days' trial with counsel to match.
Q. Supposing that a journalist, sharply but justly, criticises the actions of a man of straw—what can the man of straw do?
A. With the aid of some speculative Solicitor, he can commence an action for libel. ”

“ The price of error may be so heavy as to erect an unfair barrier against the endeavor of an honest litigant to obtain the judgment of a court. In that event, the Constitution intervenes and keeps the courtroom open. ”

“ Although a litigant is the person most directly affected by the challenged action of the Government, he may not have 'standing' to raise his objections in a court if the action has not, as it were, come to rest. ”

“ Plaintiff's cause of action * * * was his property. It has been destroyed. The district court, to punish a lawyer, has confiscated another's property without process of law, which offends the constitution. A district court does not lack disciplinary authority over an attorney and there is no justification, moral or legal, for its punishment of an innocent litigant for the personal conduct of his counsel. ”

“ Unlike the role allowed to judges in a few state courts and to the Supreme Court of Canada, our exclusive business is litigation. [4] The requisites of litigation are not satisfied when questions of constitutionality though conveyed through the outward forms of a conventional court proceeding do not bear special relation to a particular litigant. The scope and consequences of our doctrine of judicial review over executive and legislative action should make us observe fastidiously the bounds of the litigious process within which we are confined. ”

“ Whenever, therefore, upon the contestation of these competent litigants, any fact appears to the court exhibiting the capture to be unlawful and void, that fact is to have its consequence in a sentence of restitution, as necessarily as upon any other form of presentation to or cognizance by the court of the fact in question. It is impossible for the court to ignore such fact, for it is alleged and proved by a litigant, to whom it is open to allege and prove whatever is pertinent and is true, bearing upon the question of prize or no prize. ”

“ Legal procedure is a facility of rights, and rights achieved, its purpose is done. A successful litigant does not need the delay and provision of a rehearing. He has more efficient and enduring relief. ”

“ Shortly stated, the construction placed upon this section is, that the word 'parties' is not used collectively, meaning all of the litigants on the one side or the other, but is intended as if the word 'litigants' had been used, and that the words 'or either of them' mean 'any of them,' and that the jurisdiction conferred embraces all controversies in which any litigant on either side is a citizen of the United States or a subject of a foreign country. ”

“ In matters of policy, involving the form, timing, and substance of litigation, such attorneys are subject to the directions of petitioner and not of those nominally their clients. Further, the methods used to obtain litigants are not conducive to encouraging the kind of attorney-client relationships which the State reasonably may demand. ”

“ THE LITIGANT'S VADE MECUM.
Question. Can you tell me the best possible regulations in the universe?
Answer. Certainly English Common Law.
Q. Is English Common Law accessible to everyone?
A. Certainly, and if a litigant please, he or she (for sex makes no difference) can become his or her own advocate.
Q. When a litigant prefers to conduct a case in person, does the proceeding invariably save expense? ”

“ A professional class of temporal attorneys whose business it is to appear on behalf of litigants is prominent in the nation. The idea of representation has spread outwards from a king who has so many affairs that he can not conduct them in person. Men often appear to defend themselves in the king's court by attorney. But attorneys do not conduct prospective litigation for a client. Attorneys are now drawn from the knightly class of landed gentlemen, instead of ecclesiastical orders. ”

“ Injustice.—Jurisdiction is not given for the sake of the judge, but for that of the litigant. ”

“ FORMA PAUPERIS. [Latin] In the character of a poor person -- a method by which a litigant without money for lawyers is considerately permitted to lose his case. ”

“ Thus, when a common-law court renders a judgment in an action that the plaintiff recover of the defendant a certain sum of money as a compensation for a tort or for a breach of obligation, it follows up the judgment by issuing a writ to the sheriff, under which the latter seizes the defendant’s property, and either delivers it to the plaintiff at an appraised value in satisfaction of the judgment, or sells it, and pays the judgment out of the proceeds of the sale. ”

“ The prime object of all litigation is to establish a right asserted by the plaintiff or to sustain a defense set up by the party pursued. Save in a few instances where, by statute or the settled practice of the courts, the plaintiff is permitted to sue for the benefit of another, he is bound to show an interest in the suit personal to himself, and even in a proceeding which he prosecutes for the benefit of the public, as, for example, in cases of nuisance, he must generally aver an injury peculiar to himself, as distinguished from the great body of his fellow citizens. ”

“ Judge Blagden leaned back in his chair and listened to the lawyer with grave attention. The attorney for the defendant stared at the speaker in blank astonishment.
It was, Martin continued impressively, a case in which a knowledge of all the facts was of supreme importance. To understand certain actions one must follow the wires that control them, underground or overhead, until the hand which clutches them be discovered. For this reason he would take the liberty of detailing to the Court the history of the litigation. ”

“ And as this same extent of enquiry may, on the other hand, produce inconvenience to the subject, by affording occasion to litigious persons of distressing others, by bringing them from a great distance to these assizes, on frivolous or ill grounded complaints, it may be ordered that, where the cause shall appear to the court truly litigious, the plaintiff shall be bound over to stand suit at law, for damages to the defendant: and, one or two 146examples, of this nature, will prove a barr to frivolous litigation. ”

“ I told him I advised the plaintiffs that they had a good case. ‘Good case!’ he roars. ‘There’s not the slightest justice in the claim—not a scintilla of justice, Sir!’ ‘But we can win,’ I told him, and I showed the old fool where the defendant had slipped up in the wording of his contract and how we had him cold. Well, darn me, if he didn’t get hotter under the collar than before, asking me if I thought his firm were hired tricksters and bravos and I don’t know what. ”

“ By matter in dispute is meant the subject of litigation,-the matter upon which the action is brought and issue is joined, and in relation to which, if the issue be one of fact, testimony is taken. It is conceded that the pecuniary value of the matter in dispute may be determined, not only by the money judgment prayed, where such is the case, but in some cases by the increased or diminished value of the property directly affected by the relief prayed, or by the pecuniary result to one of the parties immediately from the judgment. ”

“ Any person who has an interest in the matter at litigai on, in the success of either of the parties to the action, or against either or both, may become a party to any action or proceeding between other persons, either by joining the plaintiff in claiming what is sought by the complaint, or by uniting with the defendant in resisting the claim of the plaintiff, or by demanding anything adversely to both the plaintiff and defendant, or either of them, either before or after issue has been joined in the cause, and before the trial commences. ”

“ If an attorney or solicitor delays his client's suits to work his own gain or over charges his client, the client can recover his costs and treble damages and the attorney and solicitor shall be disbarred. None may be admitted to any court of the king but such as have been brought up in the same court or is otherwise well-practiced in soliciting of causes and has been found by their dealings to be skillful and honest. An attorney who allows another to use his name shall forfeit 400 shillings and be disbarred. ”

“ The doctrine of res judicata rests at bottom upon the ground that the party to be affected, or some other with whom he is in privity, has litigated or had an opportunity to litigate the same matter in a former action in a court of competent jurisdiction. Southern Pacific R. R. v. United States, 168 U.S. 1, 48, 18 Sup. Ct. 18, 42 L. Ed. 355; Greenl. Ev. §§ 522, 523. The opportunity to be heard is an essential requisite of due process of law in judicial proceedings. ”

“ Whenever the res is seized in admiralty proceedings proper, or in revenue or other proceedings partaking of that character, the property is condemned and sold, and with the distribution of the proceeds the case ends, unless some one appears in court as claimant either of the res or its proceeds. When a claimant appears he becomes a party to the proceedings, and may defend, take an appeal, or writ of error, or adopt any other proceeding that a party properly before the court may be entitled to. ”

“ The secretary for signing, and the clerk for writing your commission; the cashier for delivering it, and the messenger for informing you of it, have all their fixed prices. Have you a lawsuit, the judge announces to you that so much has been offered by your opponent, and so much is expected from you, if you desire to win your cause. When you are the defendant against the Crown, the attorney or solicitor-general lets you know that such a douceur is requisite to procure such an issue. Even in criminal proceedings, not only honour, but life, may be saved by pecuniary sacrifices. ”

“ We think not. It is well settled in this court that when two or more plaintiffs, having several interests, unite, for the convenience of litigation, in a single suit, it can only be sustained in the court of original jurisdiction, or on appeal in this court, as to those whose claims exceed the jurisdictional amount, and that, when two or more defendants are sued by the same plaintiff in one suit, the test of jurisdiction is the joint or several character of the liability to the plaintiff. ”

“ The record stated that the parties came by their attorneys, 'and the issue joined by consent is tried by the court, a jury being waived;' and that the court, having heard the evidence and arguments, 'finds the issue for the plaintiff, and assesses his damages at the sum of $7,173.42; whereupon the defendants enter their motion for a new trial and in arrest of judgment, which, being heard by the court, is overruled,' and judgment rendered for the plaintiff for that sum and costs. ”

“ It is, at this time of day, to the interest of no one that litigation should cease, and so the Chancery suit, in which we are all concerned, is likely to go on for ever."
"But, surely litigation is expensive?" suggested Mr. Punch.
"I should rather think it was," returned the wig-wearer. "The Law is a noble profession, and it is only right and proper that those who indulge in it should pay for it. ”

“ The defendant requested the Court to charge the jury as follows:—1. That the defendant does not in any manner stand as an insurer in relation to the business of his office, and is only held to ordinary diligence in the discharge of the duties of his office, and can only be made liable for losses occasioned by a want of such diligence, and that the burden of proof is upon the plaintiff, to establish the fact of the want of such diligence. ”

“ If, upon trial, the defendant pleads title in himself, or in another person under whom he claims the premises, the case is to be certified to the supreme court of the District of Columbia, and each party is to recognize to the other,-the defendant, 'to pay all intervening damages and costs and reasonable intervening rent for the premises'; and the plaintiff, to enter the suit, and to pay all costs adjudged against him. An appeal to the same court may be taken by either party against whom judgment is rendered by the justice of the peace. ”