114 N.Y.S. 308 | N.Y. App. Div. | 1908
While the facts in this case are a little unusual, I see no difficulty in the application of one or two very plain principles of law which have been long established.
The facts are not in dispute. Davies & Co., a corporation, on the 8th day of September, 1904, drew its check for $150 in New York city upon the defendant bank to its own order, indorsed it and obtained the money thereon from the plaintiff bank. The plaintiff forwarded the check for collection to its Albany correspondent, the Albany Trust Company, which forwarded it to the defendant, by which it was received on Saturday, September tenth. On Monday, September twelfth, Davies & Co. had on deposit with the defendant bank to its credit $473. On that day the defendant bank marked the check paid and charged the amount thereof against the account of Davies & Co., and credited it on their books to the account of the Albany Trust Company, which was conceded to be plaintiff’s agent. Some time on that day, whether before or after the marking of the check paid and its entry in the books matters not, one Seaman called at the defendant bank and advised the officers thereof that the money to the credit of Davies & Co. in that bank belonged to him, and he forbade the payment of any checks drawn upon that account. The next day the defendant bank canceled the paid mark upon the check and made other entries upon its books, crediting the amount of the check to the account of Davies & Co. and charging the account of the Albany Trust Company therewith. The check was then protested and returned to the plaintiff. A few days later Seaman commenced an action in equity against this defendant, this plaintiff, Davies & Co., and the trustee in bankruptcy of Davies & Co., which had meanwhile been adjudged bankrupt, the purpose
The check, when presented to the defendant, was paid by its acceptance by the defendant as valid, by marking the same paid, crediting the amount to the account of the plaintiff’s agent, the Albany Trust Company, and charging it against the account of Davies & Co. As a matter of law, that closed the transaction without power of revocation. The defendant bank had become the debtor of the plaintiff’s agent to the extent of the amount of the credit given, which was the amount of the check. In Oddie v. Nat. City Bank of New York (45 N. Y. 735, 741) the court says: “Here the plaintiffs clearly put in the check as a deposit, and the defendants as clearly received it as such, and credited the plaintiff with it. The credit on the deposit ticket was as significant an act, evincing the consent of the defendants to the payment of it, as if made upon the pass-book of the plaintiffs and entered upon the books of the bank. Financial business is transacted at banks in large amounts with great rapidity, but according to definite and certain rules, which are well understood and acted upon by those engaged in that business. Yery little is said, but very much is understood, and there is an absence of all formalities which tend to embarrass the facility of doing the business. In determining the legal effect of such transactions, we must apply the same rules applicable to all contracts and business affairs and effectuate and carry out the intention of the parties, to be gathered from their acts and declarations and the accustomed and understood course of the particular business. Applying these rules, there can be no doubt but there was an express demand on one side and consent on the other, that this check should be placed to the credit of the plaintiffs as a deposit. The legal effect of the transaction was precisely the same as though the money had been first paid to the plaintiffs and then deposited.
In legal effect there was just as much a payment of the check of $150 by the defendant to the plaintiff through its Albany correspondent, as though a messenger from the plaintiff bank had presented the check at the teller’s window of the defendant bank and received therefor the currency. Inasmuch as this conduct took place before the commencement of the Seaman action and before judgment therein, that action cannot of course be a bar to the maintenance of this. Suppose that an officer of the plaintiff bank had presented this check personally to the defendant bank on the twelfth of September and received therefor $150 in currency. The ti-ansaction was perfectly valid; Davies & Co. had nominally to. its credit with the defendant bank a sum sufficient to pay the check, and it cannot be supposed that Seaman, in the action which he brought, could have reached this sum of $150 in the hands of the plaintiff bank after such actual payment in cash. The defendant is in no better position, as the facts are. If there had been, as there was in law, actual payment of this check by the defendant on the twelfth of September, the Seaman action could not rightfully reach the $150 of such payment; if the defendant has paid out the full sum of $473 to Seaman, it has of course done so at its peril, and is unfortunately the loser. The adjudication in the Seaman case that $473 should be paid by the First National Bank of Middletown to him, merely contemplated that all of the moneys with the First National Bank to the credit of Davies & Co. should be paid to Sea
The judgment ought, therefore, to be affirmed, with costs.
Jenks, Gaynor, Rich and Miller, JJ., concurred.
Judgment affirmed, with costs.