John J. Healy v. Thomas Bateman, 2 R.I. 454

Brayton, J. delivered the opinion of the Court. In this case it appears, that in the Court below a trial by jury was waived, as the parties might do under the statute, and the whole case .submitted to the Court upon the law and the facts. The case is brought here, not by appeal, which would open the whole case here for a new trial upon the facts, but by a bill of exceptions, by which the questions of law decided by the Court below only are open. The rules of law applicable are very clearly laid down in the reasons assigned for the rulings in the case.

From the view of the law taken by that Court we see no reason to dissent. It certainly could not have been intended that the terms, “ tools necessary for his usual occupation,” should be understood to mean those of absolute necessity, viz., such without which the debtor could not prosecute his work at all, but such as are reasonably necessary for the prosecution of it advantageously and usefully.

Any other construction would be very little protection, since any mechanic may in some way go on with his work with a very much smaller amount of tools than are usually supposed to be necessary for doing his work to advantage. Now this kind of necessity may very well exist in relation to one individual, and not as regards another.

It is by availing himself of new tools, often improved and better adapted to the prosecution of his labor, that improvements are made by the mechanic, and there is no reason why they should not be as much protected on their first introduction, as after they should have come into general use. Every mechanic has some tools not used by others. Having no reason to overrule the law as laid down in this case, it is not necessary for us to say whether we should have come to the same conclusion upon the evidence. With the facts we have nothing to do.

The question of fact, whether the articles in question were tools necessary to the usual occupation of the plaintiff, was the question submitted to the Court, as it would have been to a jury, but it is- not a question open here. The parties are bound by the finding of the Court, as they would have been by a verdict in the cause. Judgment affirmed, with additional costs.