This Court has heretofore decided in several cases that in order
to bring the questions of law before this Court by writ of error,
the facts must be found in
Page 62 U. S. 224
the court below by a jury by a general or special verdict or
must be agreed upon in a case stated.
And also that where the parties agree that the court shall
decide questions both of law and fact, none of the questions
decided, either of fact or law, can be reviewed by this Court on a
writ of error.
The practice in Louisiana is an exception to this general rule,
as that practice is sanctioned by the act of Congress which
requires the courts of the United States to conform to the practice
of the state courts.
The case having been decided by this Court upon a point of
practice, it is necessary to state only so much of its as to show
how the point of practice arose.
It was a suit in the nature of an ejectment, brought by Boyreau
to recover all the undivided half of an undivided eighteenth part
of that certain tract of land, rancho, or farm, known as the
"Rancho San Leandro," situate in the County of Alameda, state
aforesaid, bounded as follows: on the north by the San Leandro
Creek; on the west by the Bay of San Francisco; on the south by the
San Lorenzo Creek; and on the east by a line commencing on the
southern bank of the San Leandro Creek at a point on said bank from
whence a line bearing south, 29 degrees east, will strike the
eastern bank of a lagoon, situated about six or seven chains south
of said creek, thence running on said line about two hundred and
sixty-two 262 chains, parallel with a ridge of hills running from
the San Leandro Creek to the San Lorenzo Creek, at a point at the
base of the foot hills on the said creek.
Upon the trial, the whole case was submitted to the court, a
jury being expressly waived by agreement of parties, and the
evidence and arguments of counsel being heard, the court proceeded
to find a long history of facts, which is set forth in the record.
The copy of the grant offered in evidence excluded land on the east
occupied by the Indians, and the court, in its finding, ran the
east line in such a way as to exclude two of the defendants, who
were pronounced not guilty. All the evidence
Page 62 U. S. 225
necessary for the court to make up its opinion upon this point,
and also upon other facts in the case, would seem to belong more
appropriately to a jury. The second bill of exceptions contained
the elaborate opinion of the court, in which questions of fact and
questions of law were all decided.
MR. CHIEF JUSTICE TANEY delivered the opinion of the Court.
This is an action of ejectment, although the pleadings are not
in the form prescribed by the common law to recover a tract of land
called San Leandro, situated in California. It was brought in the
circuit court of the United States for that district. The parties
agreed to waive a trial of the facts by a jury, and that the facts
as well as the law should be decided by the court, upon the
evidence adduced by the parties.
In pursuance of this agreement, evidence was offered on both
sides, and the court proceeded to decide the facts in dispute, and
then proceeded to decide the questions of law arising on the facts
so found by the court, and finally gave judgment against the
plaintiffs in error, who were defendants in the court below. And
this writ of error is brought to revise that judgment.
It appears by the transcript that several exceptions to the
opinion of the court were taken at the trial by the plaintiffs in
error -- some to the admissibility of evidence and others to the
construction and legal effect which the court gave to certain
instruments of writing. But it is unnecessary to state them
particularly, for it has been repeatedly decided by this Court
that, in the mode of proceeding which the parties have seen proper
to adopt, none of the questions, whether of fact or of law, decided
by the court below can be reexamined and revised in this Court upon
a writ of error.
It will be sufficient, in order to show the grounds upon
which
Page 62 U. S. 226
this doctrine has been maintained and how firmly it has been
settled in this Court, to refer to two or three recent cases,
without enumerating the various decisions previously made, which
maintain the same principles. The point was directly decided in
Gould v.
Frontin, 18 How. 135, which, like the present, was
a case from California, where a court of the United States had
adopted the same mode of proceeding with that followed in the
present instance. And the decision in that case was again
reaffirmed in the case of
Suydam v.
Williamson, 20 How. 432, and again in the case of
Kelsey v.
Forsyth, 21 How. 85, decided at the present
term.
Indeed, under the acts of Congress establishing and organizing
the courts of the United States, it is clear that the decision
could not be otherwise, for so far as questions of law are
concerned, they are regulated in their modes of proceeding
according to the rules and principles of the common law, with the
single exception of the courts in the State of Louisiana, of which
we shall presently speak. And by the established and familiar rules
and principles which govern common law proceedings, no question of
the law can be reviewed and reexamined in an appellate court upon
writ of error except only where it arises upon the process,
pleadings, or judgment in the cause, unless the facts are found by
a jury by a general or special verdict, or are admitted by the
parties, upon a case stated in the nature of a special verdict
stating the facts and referring the questions of law to the
court.
The finding of issues in fact by the court upon the evidence is
altogether unknown to a common law court, and cannot be recognized
as a judicial act. Such questions are exclusively within the
province of the jury, and if, by agreement of parties, the
questions of fact in dispute are submitted for decision to the
judge upon the evidence, he does not exercise judicial authority in
deciding, but acts rather in the character of an arbitrator. And
this Court therefore cannot regard the facts so found as judicially
determined in the court below, nor examine the questions of law, as
if those facts had been conclusively determined by a jury or
settled by the admission of the parties. Nor can any exception be
taken to an opinion of the
Page 62 U. S. 227
court upon the admission or rejection of testimony or upon any
other question of law which may grow out of the evidence unless a
jury was actually empanelled and the exception reserved while they
were still at the bar. The statute which gives the exception in a
trial at common law gives it only in such cases. And as this Court
cannot regard the facts found by the judge as having been
judicially determined in the court below, there are no facts before
us upon which questions of law may legally and judicially have
arisen in the inferior court, and no questions, therefore, open to
our revision as an appellate tribunal. Consequently, as the circuit
court had jurisdiction of the subject matter and the parties and
there is no question of law or fact open to our reexamination, its
judgment must be presumed to be right and on that ground only
affirmed.
The cases referred to in the argument, which were brought up by
writs of error to a circuit court of Louisiana, do not apply to
this case. The Act of Congress of May 26, 1824, 4 Stat. 62, adopted
the practice of the state courts in the courts of the United
States. And a writ of error to a circuit court of that state
therefore is governed by different principles from a like writ to
the circuit court of any other state. And as, by the laws of
Louisiana, the facts, by consent of parties, may be tried and found
by the court without the intervention of a jury, this Court is
bound, upon a writ of error, to regard them as judicially
determined, and treat them as if they had been found by the special
verdict, and the questions of law which arise on them are
consequently open to the revision of this Court.
But the practice in relation to the decisions in that state is
an exception to the general rules and principles which regulate the
proceedings of the courts of the United States; nor can the laws or
the practice of any other state authorize a proceeding in the
courts of the United States different from that which was
established by the acts of 1789 and 1803 and the subsequent laws
carrying out the same principles and modes of proceeding.
Upon the grounds above stated, the judgment in this case
Page 62 U. S. 228
must be
Affirmed. But it must at the same time be understood that
this Court express no opinion as to the facts or the law as decided
by the circuit court, and that the whole case is open to
reexamination and revision here if the questions of fact or law
should hereafter be brought legally before us and in a shape that
would enable this Court to exercise its appellate
jurisdiction.
