Opinion. cial proceedings may be avoided, by proof that proper notice was not given, in opposition to a positive averment on the record that it was "; and citing several cases to that effect, finally admits the established rule in this language: "But the weight of authority is much the other way, and in favor of the position taken in Foot v. Stevens, and Hart V. Seixas, that where the cause is within the jurisdiction of a superior court, it will be presumed to have taken the necessary steps to acquire jurisdiction over the parties". citing a great number of decisions both of the supreme court of the United States, and of many of the States, and among them the case of Reynolds v. Stansbury, 20 Ohio, 344, where an order vacating a judgment was held valid, although there was nothing in the record to indicate that the plaintiff was notified to appear and show cause; and the court said that while the judgments of inferior courts were void, unless the record showed that the parties had appeared or been summoned, there was a conclusive presumption in favor of the proceedings of a superior court. So, in the notes to Crepps v. Durden, it is also said: "It was decided in Horner v. Doe, 1 Ind. 131; Wright v. Marsh, 2 Iowa, 94; and Pierce v. Griffin, 16 Id. 552, that the parties will be presumed to have been amenable to the authority of the court, unless the record shows that they were not; while it was held in Moore v. Stooks, 1 Ohio St. 369, that a judgment cannot be impeached for want of notice, unless the failure to give it appears by something more explicit than the mere failure of the record to show that it was given." And it is said: "The soundness of these decisions can hardly be doubted, if we reflect that where the parties reside within the jurisdiction, the question whether notice was given and a day assigned for them to appear, turns not on whether the requisite authority existed, but on whether it was properly exercised, and consequently falls within the general rule that everything must be presumed Opinion. in favor of the proceedings of superior courts, unless there is a plain excess or want of authority. The rule thus established is essential to the repose and safety of society, and the inconvenience and uncertainty which would result from the establishment of a less stringent rule would greatly outweigh any possible benefits to be derived thereby. When a court of general jurisdiction (as in this case) has pronounced judgment, its adjudication should be as conclusive on the question whether a party was duly notified as on any other point necessary to a proper determination of the cause. Trimble v. Long, 13 Ohio N. S. 431. In view of the authorities collected in the notes to Crepps v. Durden we can but concur in the clearly expressed and sound reasoning of the counsel for the appellees, that there is nothing in the language there used to indicate that that cogent reasoning is meant to be applied only to those cases wherein the judgment of a court of general jurisdiction is attacked in a collateral proceeding, or that there is any reason for so limiting it. Every argument in favor of the judgment in the one case applies with equal force in the other. It is well said in argument by counsel for the appellees that verity is assumed for the judgments, not because it is collaterally attacked, but for reasons inherent in the nature of the tribunal whose judgment it is, and for reasons of policy so strongly expressed in the authorities cited. We do not, however, have to look beyond Virginia for authority in support of the rule in question. In Harman v. City of Lynchburg, 33 Gratt. 43, Burks, J., delivering the opinion of this court, said: "The judgment of a court of competent jurisdiction is always presumed to be right until the contrary is shown, and a party in an appellate court, alleging error in the court below, must show it in the regular way, or the presumption in favor of its correct Opinion. ness must prevail." And in the same opinion Judge Burks quotes with approbation the opinion of Lord Wensleydale in Mayor, &c., of Beverly v. Attorney-General, 6 H. L. Cases, 310, in which his lordship, indicating the degree of weight attributable to a judgment of a court of competent jurisdiction when brought under review, said: "I take it to be perfectly clear that when a court of error is considering a former decision on appeal, that decision is not to be overturned unless the court of error is perfectly satisfied that the decision is wrong. Prima facie it is to be considered a right decision, and is not to be deprived of its effect unless it is clearly proved to the satisfaction of the judges that the decision is wrong; but he must consider the whole circumstances together, and if he still feels satisfied upon the whole of the case that the decision is wrong, he ought undoubtedly to overturn it; it is only to be considered as prima facie right. The onus lies upon the opposite party to show that it is wrong, and if he satisfies the conscience of the judge that it is wrong it ought to be reversed." Squared by the rule thus established, has the appellant made out her case? Has she shown that what she asserted in her petition in the court below was true? Did she do any thing to satisfy the conscience of the judge that she had no notice, that she had no day in court, that she had not been properly made a party to the suit? Clearly she did not show either. At the utmost she did no more than to raise a doubt upon the question. This was not enough. She was required by the rule to do more; she was required to prove her case; she did not do so; she did not even resort to proper proceedings to bring up from the clerk's office of New Kent, where the suit was brought, to the judge of the circuit court of King William, before whom the case was tried, the rule book and process book provided by law to show that causes have been regularly matured Opinion. for hearing. This would have established her contention, if true, or would have gone far to do so. She simply contented herself with assailing the records of the court by assertions contained in her petition, which was unsupported by affidavit, and thus relying solely upon the insufficient circumstance that the original process did not show that she had been served with notice, when she was named on the face of the bill as one of the defendants; when her infant children, presumably living with her, were defendants, and appear to have been served with notice; when she had been notified by the commissioner who sold the land of the time and place of sale, and when by her agent she was present, and a bidder at that sale; and when, from all the circumstances disclosed by the record, we must presume that process was served on her. It is true her name does not appear in the process found in the record at the date of her petition, but there may have been and presumably was an additional writ, especially for her. This often occurs in practice. The attorney, in making his memorandum for the clerk, in the beginning, may have unintentionally omitted her name, or, if not so omitted, the clerk in issuing the writ may by oversight have failed to insert her name in the writ. In either case the defect, when discovered, could only be remedied by a separate writ against her, for there can be but one original writ in any case, though there may be as many copies as necessary. It was certainly competent to supplement or cure the defect in the original in this way; the object of the writ being notice, the law would be substantially complied with. That such writ did issue seems from the record most probable. The writ found now in the record was sued out on the 5th, and served on the 7th of October, 1878; the bill was not filed until January rules, 1879. Between these dates there were four rule days, to any one of which such sepa Opinion. rate writ might have been and probably was returned. The bill when filed contains her name as one of the defendants. The bill was not taken for confessed until the April rules, 1879. Here again intervened three rule days, to any one of which such separate writ might have been returned. The bill was taken for confessed as to the defendants without exception. Then the decree of May 31st, 1879, brings the cause on upon the bill taken for confessed as to all the defendants, without any exception. We must presume it highly improbable that the counsel who brought the suit and prosecuted it in the court below would have taken this decree, or that the court would have entered it if the cause had not been regularly matured for hearing. In fact, it is highly improbable that the clerk, with his rule and process book, as well as his fee book, before him, would ever have put the case on the hearing docket when it was not ready for hearing. Again, aside from the presumption that the case was regularly matured and heard, the fair presumption is that there was such separate writ, and that it was lost from the papers or mislaid. The file of papers passed through two clerks' offices-the one in New Kent and the other in King William. That they have not passed unharmed is apparent from the fact that the record is incomplete in other respects; two other papers at least have come up missingthe one is the exceptions to the report of the commissioner who took the account in the case, the other is the report of the commissioners who assigned the widow's dower. It can with no more certainty be said that either of these papers was once a part of the record than that this missing writ was. All the proceedings at rules in this suit were had in the circuit court of New Kent. When the case came on for hearing in the circuit court of King William, that court did not have the books in New Kent before it; but the |