Procedure on Appeal I would have the court aim at ulti mate justice, irrespective of anything in the pleadings or anything omitted from the pleadings. I would have the court take the evi dence offered by the parties, but not be confined to this source of informa tion. I would have the court, of its own motion, bring in other parties or hear other witnesses, adjourning the proceedings from time to time, if neces sary, until the matter in controversy is thoroughly examined into. The courts should have power to inspect public or private records and documents, to appoint medical or other experts, to re quire the party seeking relief to do or abstain from doing acts not necessarily referred to in the pleadings, and it should get at the kernel of the dispute and should see to it that no decision is made on such silly grounds, for ex ample, as that the exemplification of a record is not exact, or that copies in stead of originals are used where there is no question that the copies are accu rate. This system relegates to the limbo of the past all the humbug about the dis tinctions between law and equity pleadings. It will allow parties to have re lief, whether in law or in equity, and whether they have put the claims upon paper correctly or not. For no injustice can be done by abolishing formal plead ings so long as the courts are enabled to protect against surprise, and to re quire the parties to stand for justice. I suggest, therefore, that the judicial system of Oregon be so revised as to enable the supreme court to review an appealed case upon the original record and without printed abstracts or briefs, and at once. This will operate to dis courage appeals that are taken for de lay, and will enable the appellate court to dispense with written opinions upon
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points that have already, in its judg ment, been correctly decided, and where no new principle or unusual features re quire more careful examination and more elaborate expression of opinion. But, even if this important reform is not adopted in full, still it is not too much to demand that all formali ties of appeals be abolished. A suitable bond or undertaking having been fur nished, it should under any circum stances be sufficient to lodge in the appellate court a copy of the judgment and the report of the trial, and the ap pellate court should confine its deci sion to the merits of the controversy; and if it finds that any evidence of im portance has been omitted that could and ought to be supplied, it should re ceive it, and it should affirm or modify the decision in accordance with ultimate justice, and without being bound by any technical rules whatever. These plans, it will be perceived, change radically the duties and func tions of appellate courts. Printed briefs and abstracts will be no longer necessary. The courts will be courts of review with comprehensive powers sufficient to en able them to dispose of the cases with out returning them to the trial court, except in rare and exceptional instances. Instead of bills of exception to confine these courts to the consideration of certain errors in law cases that are claimed to have occurred on the trial, the appellate courts should be open to supplement the investigation made by the inferior court, with a view to reach ing substantial justice; so that, if it appear that the trial judge eliminated subjects of inquiry that should have been gone into, or confined the inquiry where it should have been given wider scope, the appellate court should be free to go into these matters fully. Under this system the verdicts of
