RES JUDICATA (Lat. the matter has been adjudged). A legal or equitable issue which has been decided by a court of competent ju risdiction.
When one is barred in any action, real or personal, by judgment, demurrer, confession, or verdict, he is bound as to that or a like action forever ; 14 Q. B. D. 146 ; XII B. L.
R. 304.
When a question is necessarily decided in effect though not in express terms between parties to the suit, they cannot raise the same question as between themselves in any other suit in any other form ; 3 Atkins 626. This definition of Lord Hardwicke, in Greg ory v. Molesworth, has been by some writers considered the best.
The doctrine of res judicata is plain and intelligible, and amounts simply to this, that a cause of action once finally determined, without appeal, between the Aquirei,7011 the merits, by a competent tribunal, cannot aft erwards be litiga e y a new proceeding ei ther before the same or any_other tribunal ; Foster v. Busteed, 100 Mass. 409, 1 Am. Rep. 125.
Estoppel. rests on equitable principles, while res judicata does not rest upon equita ble principles, but on the two maxims which were its foundation in the Roman Law (see infra) ; Ind. L. R. VIII. All. 332; it is rather a principle of public policy than the result of equitable considerations. It is also a mat ter of private right ; Putnam v. Clark, 34 N. J. Eq. 535.
It has been characterized as a "funda mental concept in the organization of civil society ;" Jeter v. Hewitt, 22 How. (U. S.) 352, 16 L. Ed. 345.
It was derived from Roman law, being founded on the maxims nerno debet bis vew ari pro cadent causa (no one ought to be twice sued for the same cause of action), and interest reipubiiece ut sit finis litium, (it is the interest of the state that there should be an end of litigation).
It was said by the civilians res judicata Melt eye alto mignon, ex nigro album, ex cur vo reckon, ex recto curvum (a decision makes white black ; black, white ; the crook ed, straight ; the straight, crooked).
It was said by Blackburn, L. J., that the doctrine was not received in England, as it was on the continent, directly from the Ro man law ; L. R. 2 App. Cas. 530.
A broad distinction is pointed out in Crom well v. County of Sac, 94 U. S. 352, 24 L. Ed. "It should be borne in mind that there is a difference between the effect of a judg ment as a bar or estoppel against the prosecu tion of a second action upon the same claim or demand, and its effect as an estoppel in another action between the same parties upon a different act/1m or cause of action. In the former case, the judgment, if rendered upon the merits, constitutes an absolute bar to a subsequent action. . . . But where the
second action between the same parties is up on a different claim or demand, the judg ment' in the prior action operates as an es toppel only as to those matters in issue or points controverted, upon the determination of which the finding or verdict was rendered." Where thvelsuse of action is the same. In order to make a matter res judleata, there must be a concurrence of the four conditions following: 1. Identity in the thing sued for; 5 M. & W. 109; Bull v. Hopkins, 7 Johns. (N. Y.) 22.
2. Identity of the cause of action; Hop kins v. Lee, 6 Wheat. (U. S.) 109, 5 L. Ed. 218 ; Minor v. Walter, 17 Mass. 237 ; Colt v. Tracy, 8 Conn. 268, 20 Am. Dec. 110; Cist v. Zeigler, 16 S. & R. (Pa.) 282, 16 Am. Dec. 573; McGrady v, Monks, 1 Tex. Civ. App. 611, 20 S. W. 959.
3. Identity of persons and of parties to the action ; Legrand v. Rixey's Adm'r, 83 Va. 862, 3 S. E. 864 ; Sanford v. Oberlin College, 50 Kan. 342, 31 Pac. 1089.
4. Identity of the quality in the persons for or against whom the claim is made ; 5 Co. 32 b; 6 Mann. •& G. 164.
The simplest test as to whether it is the same cause of action is whether the cause of action has been merged in the former judg ment. It is thus expressed by Lord Selborne, 2 App. Cas. 519: "When there is res judicata the original cause of action is gone." In Lawrence v. Vernon, 3 Sumn. 22, Fed. Cas. No. 8,146, Judge Story said: "What is meant by the same cause of action is where the same facts will support both actions. This is a test to know whether a final deter mination in a former action is a bar or not to a subsequent action." To the same effect, 1 DeG., F. & J. 178, per Lord Westbury. In 15 C. B. N. S. 99, Willes, J., said: "To constitute a good plea of res judicata, it must be shown that the former suit was one in which the plaintiff might have recovered Precisely what he seeks to recover in the second." So in [1893] 2 Q. B. 172.
In 14 Q. B. D. 147, Bowen, L. J., said: "The principle is frequently stated in the form of another legal proverb, Nemo debet bis vewari pro eadem, causa. It is a well set tled rule of law that damages resulting from one and the same cause of action must be as sessed and recorded once for all. The diffi culty in each instance arises upon the appli cation of this rule, how far is the cause which is being litigated afresh the same cause 'in substance with that which has been the subject of the previous suit. "The principle consideration," says De Grey, C. J., 2 W.