A Lawsuit in Mexico By Josern WHELESS, OF THE ST. LOUIS BAR AUTHOR or “THE LAWS or MEXICO IN ENGLISH,” are.
criminal case for my text, I gave the readers of the Green Bag somewhat of a study of Mexican penal procedure, drawing some comparisons between its simplicity and expedition, and the
of the past-due notes of a copper mining company operating in Mexico enlisted my services to take steps to protect their interests. The copper mines in question are located in the state of Sonora, near its capital city, Hermosillo,
tortuous and technical course of a
—well named, for it means, and is, a
prosecution under the archaic formali
My present
“little beauty.” It was necessary there fore to reach the property through the
attempt is to invite the interest of my brethren of the bar to a civil suit under
forum ref sitw; so to that forum I resorted. It was my first “personally
Mexican procedure, being the relation
conducted" lawsuit in foreign parts; but with the confidence of him "who
N a former occasion, taking a noted
ties of our own law.l
of a case which I conducted in the courts of our sister republic, involving some interesting features of civil law practice under the excellent code of civil procedure of Mexico. At a time when American lawyers and
associations of lawyers are getting alive to the necessity of revising our own codes of practice, it may serve a useful
purpose to take note of a system based upon the most enlightened principles of
the great civil jurists of the Continent, many features of which might be profitably imitated among us to the end
of simplifying practice and expediting justice in our common law states. My narrative shall have as little as may be of personal allusion in it, though, as it is founded upon actual experiences
in the suit spoken of, which will best serve as a concrete application of many of the rules of practice which we are to make this study of, the ego must occasionally crop out; it is how
ever only as a sort of peg to hang the
tale on.
To premise then: In Decem
ber, 1908, the holders of a large amount
hath his quarrel just" I went about my in teresting employment with no misgivings as to the result of my maiden efforts in pleading in a friendly foreign tribunal. As I intimated, the evidences of debt with which I was armed were promisory notes, seventy-seven in number.
Being
all in the English language, though
drawn in form to meet the requirements of the Mexican law, which requires the nature of the consideration to be
stated both in the note and in its indorsement, and the latter to be dated, the first move was to have them all
translated into Spanish, for this must accompany their presentation in a Mexican court. The Mexican practice, and that of civil law countries generally, requires a
formal power of attorney to be executed by the client to his attorney, without which he cannot bring a suit or collect a debt or judgment. These notes being payable to a number of different holders, living in several distinct cities in the States, it would have been
a long and painful process to have them 1 See 19 Green Bag (1907) pp. 462, 532. .
all execute powers of attorney, all of
