JUDGMENT, the decision rendered by the authority to which a question or issue has been submitted for determination. In a more re stricted sense, the decision by a court of law of an issue raised by parties litigant, or the determination and declaration by such court of a legal right. There are many rulings by such a court which are not judgments, but de termine merely some incidental question, and there are judgments which are interlocutory, as well as final judgments which put an end to the controversy. But every judgment in a judicial proceedint is an adjudication by the court cou of some right of a suitor, and until set aside or reverse , is the law governing such right.
In early times the solemn character of a court record and the means which the law fur nished for the enforcement of an obligation thus established caused such a record to be adopted for the purpose of entering into an obligation as distinguished from resort to a court for the vindication of the obligation when disputed by the other party. A modern survival is found in the confession of judgment, by which a man causes his obligation to pay a sum of money to be entered upon the court records in the form of a judgment against him for the amount due. In consequence of the early practice — aided also by the fact that a judgment may be sued upon outside the juris-. diction of the court in which it was entered, like a contract — the older legal writers speak of judgments as a species of contract. But this classification has been shown to be unscientific by recent writers, since the courts have pointed out that these obligations are not contractual in either their origin or their incidents, and it is now customary to speak of them as quasi contracts.
It is stated above that a judgment is inter locutory or final. In a suit for partition of real estate a judgment that partition be made is interlocutory, and is the basis of further proceedings which result in the final judgment establishing the partition. A final judgment is one which ends the controversy, at least as to some of the parties. It is a general rule that no appeal can be taken, except from a final judgment, and while there can rarely be a case of doubt as to the finality of a technical judg ment, that is the decision rendered by a court of common-law jurisdiction, questions fre quently arise as to the finality of decrees (which correspond to judgments) entered by courts of equity. The test is whether the right is finally settled by the decree; for example, when a creditor has claimed to intervene in an equity proceeding to establish his right to share in a fund being distributed, a decree excluding him is final as to him and appealable, though in all other respects the suit remains unde termined by the court below.
A judgment of a competent court having jurisdiction of the parties and the subject mat ter is conclusive, except so far as it may be the subject of appeal to a higher court. The direct issue thus determined will not be retried by another court, and such a determination cannot be attacked collaterally except on the ground of fraud or lack of jurisdiction of the court in which the judgment was rendered. A judg
ment in personam binds only parties to the cause and those in privity with them; a judg ment in rem, which is a judgment determining the status of person or property, binds all the world. Decrees of courts of admirality are judgments in rem and conclusive of the status of the subject matter of the cause upon every one. Decrees of divorce are judgments in rem, and determine the status of the parties to the proceeding. In the United States they are pro nounced by the State courts in the administra tion of very diverse statutes relating to the sub ject of and as the courts of all the States, in addition to the general principles of comity observed between courts of different jurisdictions, are bound by the mandate of the Federal Constitution requiring that 'Tull faith and credit shall be given in each State to the public acts, records and judicial proceedings of every other State" many perplexing questions have arisen. These cases afford good illustra tions of successful collateral attacks upon jbdg ments on the ground of fraud or lack of juris diction of the court entering the judgment. It is now well settled that a decree of divorce may be successfully attacked collaterally on the ground of fraudulent collusion between the parties or lack of jurisdiction of the court pro nouncing it over the person of the defendant. It is to be observed that a final judgment is conclusive of the particular cause, and finally determines the right therein litigated, and may be pleaded in bar of any future attempt to as sert the right, except in a case in which there has been no determination on the merits; as for example, where the plaintiff has suffered a voluntary non-suit, that is, has elected in ad vance of a verdict to abandon his case. He loses that particular case and must pay the costs, but is not prevented from bringing an other action.
In most of the United States a judgment for a sum of money found to be due, from the date of its entry, and without the issuance of a writ of execution, constitutes a lien upon the real estate of the judgment debtor; that is, a claim which must be paid out of the proceeds of any judicial sale of the property in its due order of priority as compared with other liens upon the same property. This lien usually ex tends only to real estate within the jurisdiction of the court in which the judgment was entered with provision for filing a transcript to create a lien in other countries of the same State in which the debtor owns real estate. A foreign judgment, in which are included the judgments of others of the United States, must be sued on and a judgment recovered upon it to make it effective in any of the States. In such suit no defense which could have been interposed in the original suit will be allowed to the judg ment debtor.