Article 21: Special Proceedings and Actions · Last amended 2000 · Last verified July 22, 2026
Laws 1929, c. 79, § 3, p. 269; C.S.1929, § 20-21,158; R.S.1943, § 25-21,167; Laws 1991, LB 732, § 67; Laws 1992, LB 360, § 6; Laws 2000, LB 921, § 21.
Section 25-21,167 builds speed into both ends of a case. At the trial level, it tells the district court of Lancaster County to determine the action promptly rather than let it sit on an ordinary docket. Lancaster County is home to the state capital, and statutes that route a particular type of case there often do so because the dispute touches a state office, agency, or officer.
The appeal window is shorter than the general civil appeal deadline: a party has thirty days after entry of judgment to take the case to the Court of Appeals. Once there, the appeal does not wait its ordinary turn. The section directs the appellate court to expedite the case in every respect, set it for an early hearing, and advance it the way courts advance other causes that involve the public welfare and convenience.
Read on its own, the section does not say what type of claim triggers this treatment; that definition sits earlier in the statutory scheme this section belongs to. What it does establish, without qualification, is that once a case falls within this framework, both the trial court and the appellate court must move it along faster than an ordinary civil action.
It requires the district court of Lancaster County to speedily determine the action rather than handle it on the ordinary civil docket timeline.
Thirty days after entry of the judgment, shorter than the general deadline for civil appeals in Nebraska.
No. The section directs that the appeal be expedited, set for an early hearing, and advanced in every respect, not left to case-by-case discretion.
It means giving the appeal priority on the docket, the same priority courts give to other cases whose outcome affects the public rather than only the parties before the court.
Lancaster County contains the state capital, and Nebraska statutes that assign a case type to that county typically do so because the dispute involves a state office, agency, or officer.
No. It sets the trial and appellate timetable for an action already defined elsewhere; it does not by itself state what claim a plaintiff may bring.