Bowen v. Aubrey

Crocker, J. delivered the opinion of the Court—Cope, C. J. and Norton, J. concurring. This is an action to enforce a mechanics’ hen. The defendant Aubrey entered into a contract with Packard, Bayley & Simpkins, also defendants, to erect a building, known as the “ Marysville Water Works,” agreeing therein not to sublet any part of the work without the written permission of the latter. The contract also contained the following agreement on the part or Aubrey: “ The said first party hereby agrees he will not incumber er suffer to be incumbered the said building or lot on which it is erected, by any mechanics’ hens or debts of material, labor-men, contractors, sub-contractors, or otherwise.” Aubrey sublet the brick work to the intervenor, Craft. Ho written permission for this sub-contract appears to have been given by Packard, Bayley & Simpkins, yet they seem to have recognized Craft as a sub-contractor. Bowen, the plaintiff, furnished to Aubrey materials for the construction of the building, and commenced this action to enforce a hen therefor. Craft, by leave of Court, filed his complaint of intervention, claiming a hen upon the property for the work done by him, as subcontractor under Aubrey. The claim of Bowen was dismissed, and the action proceeded upon the claim of Craft alone. It was tried by a referee, who found in favor of Craft, and a judgment was rendered by which the premises were ordered to be sold, and the claim of Craft paid from the proceeds of the sale, with the costs of suit. A motion for a new trial was made and denied, and the defendants, Packard, Bayley & Simpkins, appealed from the judg[569]ment and the order overruling the motion for a new trial, to this Court.

After the filing of an amended complaint of intervention by Craft, the appellants moved to strike out certain portions thereof which state that before he, Craft, signed the sub-contract with Aubrey, he procured a writing from Aubrey directing the appellants to reserve in their hands sufficient money to pay Craft the amount of his contract with Aubrey; that he took this paper to Packard, and then proceeds to detail conversations between himself and Packard, and that afterwards he closed the contract with Aubrey; that Packard and Simpkins had made certain assertions to different persons, and that one of the appellants had admitted certain facts to him within the last six months. The Court refused to strike out this portion of the amended complaint, and this is assigned as error. The Court below, in our judgment, erred in overruling the motion to strike out. The matter objected to is clearly irrelevant, and does not comport with any rule of good pleading. It is opposed to the rules laid down in the case of Green v. Palmer (15 Cal. 411). But the respondent claims that that case was an action at law, that the present one is in equity, therefore, the rules there laid down do not apply hore; and that under the rules of equity pleading he had a right to set up matters merely of evidence in order to obtain the answer of the opposing parties to such facts, to be used against them on the trial. In other words, they claim the right to set up matters, usual in bills of discovery, under the old system of chancery practice. Under the code of practice we have but one system of rules respecting pleadings, which govern all cases, both at law and in equity. Those rules are clearly laid down in the Practice Act, and although, in construing that act, we resort to former adjudications, and the old and well-established principles of pleading, yet the former distinctions which existed between common law and equity pleadings no longer exist. The code has reduced all to one common system. In setting forth the facts of a case, which, under the old practice, would have been properly brought in a Court of Equity, they are generally stated in a mode similar to the statements in a bill in chancery, and to this there can be no objection so long as the principle of the code, which