E. C. Shevlin Co. v. United States

This is an appeal from a judgment of date December 10, 1943 awarding damages to appellant in a condemnation of appellant’s timber land in the state of Oregon in a proceeding under the act of Congress of March 27, 1942, and prior acts thereby amended, 50 U.S.C.A.Appendix, § 632. The ground of the appeal is that the District Court was without power to render the judgment from which this appeal is brought. There was a prior final judgment in the same case from which the appellee had not appealed and which, it is claimed, was illegally set aside because (1) it is a consent judgment; (2) if, since rule 81(a) (7), Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, 28 U.S.C. A. following section 723c, excludes condemnation proceedings, the conformity act 1 applies to such action by the court, the court order is based on a ground not permitted by the Oregon law after the expiration of the term of court in which the judgment was rendered; (3) it is in an ex parte proceeding and on its face invalid because for an asserted cause not warranting it; and (4) if the general federal law applies, the judgment was set aside after the ex *614 piration of the term in which it was rendered.

Prior to the judgment…

(concurring).

I agree with the result of the main opinion and for the most part with what is said in it.

There is, however, no occasion for making a mystery out of the action taken below. The trial court set aside its original judgment in this and in certain companion cases because of the belief that fraud, or imposition amounting to fraud, had probably been practiced upon it and upon the United States at the time those judgments were entered. The ensuing jury trials appear not to have borne out this belief, • In this and in some of the companion cases the verdicts were for somewhat lesser amounts than originally awarded. In others the awards appear to have been larger than before. These discrepancies proved nothing except that honest differences of opinion as to values are possible of occurrence.

I am not prepared to say that under no circumstances are the district courts without power and authority to take action of the sort taken here — even after the expiration of the term. But I do agree that under no circumstances may they take such action without a tangible showing in support of it and without giving the judgment holder an opportunity to be heard. Had this course been…