SEC. 6. When the error alleged is to the admission or to the rejection of evidence, the specification shall quote the full substance of the evidence admitted or rejected.

SEC. 7. Counsel for a defendant in error, or an appellee, shall file with the clerk twenty printed copies of his argument, at least three days before the case is called for hearing. His brief shall be of a like character with that required of the plaintiff, or appellant, except that no assignment of errors is required, and no statement of the case, unless that presented by the plaintiff or appellant is controverted.

SEC. 8. Without such an assignment of errors, counsel will not be heard, except at the request of the court, and errors not assigned according to this rule will be disregarded, though the court, at its option, may notice a plain error not assigned.

SEC. 9. When, according to this rule, a plaintiff in error, or an appellant, is in default, the case may be dismissed on motion; and when a defendant in error, or an appellee, is in default, he will not be heard, except on consent of his adversary, and with request of the

court.

SEC. 10. When no counsel appears for one of the parties, and no printed brief or argument is filed, only one counsel will be heard for the adverse party; but if a printed brief or argument is filed, the adverse party will be entitled to be heard by two counsel.

RULE 21. ARGUMENT-BRIEFS. - DECISIONS 1-31.

1. (Feb., 1796.) On the return of the record several errors were assigned, but the only one now relied on stated that the facts on which the Circuit Court had founded their decree did not appear fully upon the record, either from the pleadings and decree itself, or a state of the case agreed to by the parties or their counsel, or "by a stating of the case by the court," as required by the nineteenth section of the Judiciary Act.

The court were unanimously of opinion that the error assigned was not a sufficient ground for reversing the decree. Hills v. Ross, 3 Dall. 184, 187.

2. (Feb., 1804.) The court will require a statement of the points of a case before argument. Faw v. Marsteller, 2 Cranch, 10.

3. (Feb., 1804.) A plaintiff may assign for error the want

of jurisdiction in that court to which he has chosen to resort. Capron v. Van Noorden, 2 Cranch, 126.

4. A party may take advantage of an error in his favor, if it be an error of the court. Ib.

5. (Feb., 1805.) The court require a statement of the case, even though the question is a question of fact; at least the substance of the bill and answer and the facts which are in contest might be stated. Reily v. Lamar, 2 Cranch, 349,

note.

6. (Feb., 1805.) If a statement of the case is not furnished according to the rule, the cause must be either dismissed or continued. Peyton v. Brooke, 3 Cranch, 93.

7. (Feb., 1808.) The refusal of the court below to continue a cause after it is at issue cannot be assigned for error. Woods v. Young, 4 Cranch, 256.

8. (Feb., 1810.) The refusal of an inferior court to allow a plea to be amended, or a new plea to be filed, or to grant a new trial, or to continue a cause, cannot be assigned as error. Marine Ins. Co. v. Hodgson, 6 Cranch, 206.

9. (Feb., 1810.) It is not too late to allege as error, in the appellate court, a fault in the declaration, which ought to have prevented the rendition of a judgment in the court below. Slacum v. Pomeroy, 6 Cranch, 221.

10. (Feb., 1812.) If the counsel for the appellant neglect to furnish the court with a statement of the points of the case, the appeal will be dismissed. Schooner Catherine v. United States, 7 Cranch, 99.

11. (Feb., 1813.) Quere, whether the refusal of a court to compel a party to join in a demurrer to evidence can, in any case, be assigned for error. Young v. Black, 7 Cranch, 566.

12. (Jan., 1830.) Generally speaking, matters of practice in inferior courts do not constitute subjects upon which errors can be assigned in the appellate court. Parsons v. Bedford, 3 Pet. 434.

13. (Jan., 1833.) Matter assigned in the appellate court

as error in fact never appears upon the record of the inferior court; if it did, it would be error in law. The whole doctrine of allowing, in the appellate court, the assignment of error in fact, grows out of the circumstance that such matter does not appear on the record of the inferior court. Davis v. Packard, 7 Pet. 276.

14. (Dec., 1853.) The preceding case of O'Reilly and Morse (supra, 62) having settled the principles involved in the controversy between them, this court declines to hear an argument upon technical points of pleading in a branch of the case coming from another state. Smith v. Ely, 15 How. 137. 15. The case is remanded to the Circuit Court. Ib.

16. (Dec., 1869.) A simple omission of a court to charge the jury as fully on some one of the points of a case about which it is charging generally, as a party alleges on error that the court ought to have charged, cannot be assigned for error, when it does not appear that the party himself made any request of the court to charge in the form now asserted to have been the proper one. Express Co. v. Kountze, 8 Wall. 343.

17. (Dec., 1869.) A party in this court cannot allege as error in the court below the admission of evidence offered by himself and objected to by the other side. Avendano v. Gay, 8 Wall. 376.

18. (Dec., 1872.) A case dismissed Jan. 8, 1873, because the counsel for the appellant did not file a brief in the form required by the amendment to the twenty-first rule, promulgated Nov. 16, 1872, and to be seen at large in 14 Wall. p. ix. Portland Co. v. United States, 15 Wall. 1.

19. (Dec., 1872.) The court calls the attention of the bar to the necessity of a strict compliance with the twenty-first rule in the assignment of errors, a compliance which it declared is necessary to the disposition of the business which now "presses upon the court. It accordingly passes without any notice at all a number of errors meant to be assigned

by the plaintiff in error, but which were not assigned in the way prescribed by the said rule. Deitsch v. Wiggins, 15

Wall. 539.

20. (Dec., 1872.) A judgment affirmed, because the plaintiff in error had filed no assignment of errors or brief as required by the rules of court. Ryan v. Koch, 17 Wall. 19.

21. (Oct., 1873.) It is not error in an appellate state court, giving judgment against an appellant, to include in the judgment sureties in the appeal and writ of error bond. By signing the bond they become voluntary parties to the bond, and subject themselves to the decree. Moore v. Huntington, 17 Wall. 417.

22. (Oct., 1873.) Where, on a trial for infringement of a reissue of letters-patent, the defence being a want of novelty, -a defendant requests the court below to direct the jury to bring in a verdict for the defendant (no objection being then, or having during the trial, been taken by such defendant, that the reissue was for a different invention from that secured by the original patent), and the request for the direction just stated not having been on that ground, but on the ground of the evidence "relative to the alleged prior use of the process, and the novelty and usefulness, character, and effect of the alleged invention being so decisive as to entitle the defendant to a verdict,” — and the request has been refused, the defendant cannot assign as error the refusal to give the direction, because the reissue was not the same invention as was the original patent. Klein v. Russel, 19 Wall. 433.

23. A direction to find for one party or the other can only be given where there is no conflict of evidence. Ib.

24. (Oct., 1874.) A judgment affirmed for want of such an assignment of errors as is required by the twenty-first rule, there being in the record no plain error not assigned, and such as the court thought fit to be noticed by it without a proper assignment. Treat v. Jemison, 20 Wall. 652.

25. (Oct., 1874.) Where there is no assignment of error, the defendant in error may either move to dismiss the writ, or he may open the record and pray for an affirmance. Maxwell v. Stewart, 21 Wall. 71.

26. (Oct., 1874.) Though this court may be satisfied that a plain error has been committed, in a judgment below, against a defendant in error, and that he ought to have more than the court below adjudged to him, yet if he himself have assigned no error, the error of the court below cannot be corrected here, on the writ of the opposite side. Tilden v. Blair, 21 Wall. 241.

27. (Oct., 1874.) An assignment of error which alleges simply that the court below erred in giving the instructions which were given to the jury, in lieu of the instructions asked for, it not being stated in what the error consisted, or in what part of the charge it is, is an insufficient assignment, under the twenty-first rule of court. Lucas v. Brooks, 21 Wall. 436.

28. (Oct., 1874.) Quare: Whether a general assignment of errors, that the judgment below, on a special case, was for the wrong party, is sufficient. Scholey v. Rew, 23 Wall. 331.

29. (Oct., 1875.) Fifty-two assignments of error were filed in this case. The court condemns such a practice as a flagrant perversion of the rule on' that subject. P. and C. Construction Co. v. Seymour, 1 Otto, 646.

30. (Oct., 1879.) The court announces its determination to insist upon a strict observance by counsel of all rules intended to facilitate the examination of causes, especially those submitted. School District v. Insurance Co., 11 Otto, 472.

31. The submission of a cause under the twentieth rule set aside for non-compliance with paragraph 4, subdivision 3, of Rule 21, which provides that "when a statute of a state is cited, so much thereof as may be deemed necessary to the decision of the case shall be printed at length," either in or with the brief. Ib.