§ 1046.Affidavit, Notice, Other Paper Without Tile of Action Or Without Defective Title

Every court paper is supposed to carry the case caption identifying the action it belongs to. Section 1046 forgives the mistake when someone leaves that caption off, or gets it wrong, as long as a reader can still tell which action or proceeding the paper concerns.

The test is intelligibility, not perfection. A paper that clearly refers to the pending matter, through its content, the parties named, or other context, is treated as valid and effective for whatever purpose it was meant to serve, exactly as if it had been correctly titled.

This is a companion to § 1045's forgiveness of lost originals. Both sections keep minor paperwork errors from derailing a case: one covers documents that go missing, the other covers documents that were filed correctly but labeled incorrectly.