Scottish Court of Session Decisions

Thomas Anderson, miner, petitioned for admission to the benefit of the poor's-roll in the Court of Session, to enable him to insist in an appeal from the Sheriff of Lanarkshire in an action of damages for personal injuries at his instance against John Blackwood. Both the Sheriff-Substitute and the Sheriff had decided the case against the applicant. The Court remitted to the reporters on the probabilis causa litigandi to inquire and report whether the applicant had a probabilis causa litigandi, and in doing so to have special regard to the applicant's means. The applicant produced to the reporters a certificate of poverty from the minister and elders of the parish of Old Monkland. The certificate bore that the applicant had appeared before them and stated that he was fifty-seven years of age; that his wife was a pauper inmate of a lunatic asylum; that he had a son, aged twenty-two, living in family with him, who was earning 20s. a-week; that he was possessed of no property, and was earning an average wage of 14s. or 15s. a-week. The certificate further bore that no part of that statement was consistent with the certifiers' own proper knowledge, but that it depended entirely on the applicant's own statement, and was affected by a letter from the underground manager of the mine in which the applicant was working, which stated that he was earning “something Like 4s. Or 5s. Per day for twenty days of the four weeks.”

The reporters reported that the applicant had a probabilis causa litigandi, and that, having special regard to his means, as appearing from the certificate to be 15s. a-week, he was, in their opinion, entitled to the benefit of the poor's-roll.

Blackwood objected to the applicant's admission, and argued—The case of Stevens v. Stevens, Jan. 23, 1885, 12 R. 548, was not conclusive, for though the applicant in that case was earning 5s. a-week more than this applicant, yet he had an imbecile son to support, while on the other hand this applicant had a son living with him earning as much as Stevens did, and had no one to keep. Further, Stevens' action was one which could be brought only in the Court of Session, while this applicant had already the judgments of two Sheriffs against him.

At advising—