Research


Administrative History

A writ of certiorari was obtained by a defendant (or, in cases of replevin, by either a plaintiff or defendant) to remove a case from a lower court into the Supreme Court of Judicature for trial and judgement, or for review after judgment in the lower court. Any action in which debts or damages exceeded a set amount (100 pounds prior to 1830, thereafter $250, or $500 in New York City) was subject to removal. Any civil action to which the people or a city corporation was a party; any action involving title to real estate; and any action of replevin or for false imprisonment, no matter what the damages claimed, could also be removed by obtaining a writ of certiorari.

Most of the cases brought into the Supreme Court of Judicature by this writ were civil actions first heard by a justice of the peace or by a Court of Common Pleas. A few were removed from the mayor's courts of incorported cities. Other cases (no more than five percent of the total) were removed from the criminal courts of General Sessions of the Peace or Oyer and Terminer and General Gaol Delivery. These involved crimes such as larceny, assault, libel, perjury, murder, forgery, and so on. Many of the writs of certiorari were obtained by plaintiffs in error who needed a more complete record of proceedings in a lower court, beyond that found in the return to writ of error. There are also rare cases of appeals from decisions of the Canal Appraisers and of town commissioners of highways.