Coleman v. Southwick

In Coleman v. Southwick (9 Johns. 45, 50 [Sup Ct, NY County 1812]), the Court wrote that the source of the information is the best evidence. "Hearsay testimony is, from the very nature of it, attended with all such doubts and difficulties, and it cannot clear them up. 'A person who relates a hearsay, is not obliged to enter into any particulars, to answer any questions, to solve any dif-ficulties, to reconcile any contradictions, to explain any obscurities, to remove any ambiguities: he intrenches himself in the simple assertion that he was told so, and leaves the burden entirely on his dead or absent author.' It is against sound principle, and would at once awaken distrust, for a party to resort to a secondary species of evidence, so long as the original and primary evidence exists and can be produced." (Id.)