51 Neb. 828 | Neb. | 1897
George F. Oram sued Bernard Sickel and Luther P. Ludden, copartners, in the district court of Lancaster county to recover a balance on account for goods sold and delivered by Oram to Sickel and Ludden. The defendants below had a verdict and judgment and Oram prosecutes here a petition in error.
To a proper understanding of the points presented in this case a short statement of the facts admitted and established by the finding of the jury becomes essential.
Prior to August, 1892, Sickel and Ludden dissolved their copartnership, the agreement of dissolution providing that Sickel should assume the liabilities and be entitled to the assets of the firm. Prior to August, 1892, Oram sent the account he held against Sickel and Lud
As already stated, this suit is to recover the balancé owing from Sickel & Ludden to Cram on his account As a defense to the action Ludden pleaded that Cram’s attorney agreed with Sickel at the time the latter gave him the note and chattel mortgage that he, Ludden, should be released and discharged from all liability to Cram in consideration of Sickel’s giving the attorney the note and mortgage which he did give him. Whether this agreement was actually made by the attorney was one of the issues litigated on the trial, and in justice to the attorney it must be said that he strenuously denied having ever made any such arrangement; but the jury found that he had and we are constrained to say that there is sufficient evidence to sustain that finding, although the evidence is very unsatisfactory. Sickel defended the suit on the ground that at the time the attorney seized the property under the chattel mortgage he voluntarily surrendered the mortgaged property under an agreement between him and Cram’s attorney that by so doing the mortgaged property should be taken and accepted in full satisfaction of the note which it was pledged to secure. Whether this arrangement was made was another issue litigated on the trial, and the jury found that it was so entered into; and the evidence, we think, supports the
The authority of an agent to collect the debt of his principal does not invest such agent with authority to take the property other than money of the debtor in payment of such a claim. (Taylor v. Robinson, 14 Cal., 396.)
Without special authority an agent can only receive payment of the debt due his principal in money in the legal currency of the country. (Ward v. Smith, 74 U. S., 447; McCormick v. Wood Mowing & Reaping Machine Co., 72 Ind., 518; Graydon v. Patterson, 13 Ia., 256; Fellows v. Northrup, 39 N. Y., 117.)
In Nowlan v. Jackson, 16 Ill., 272, it was held that an attorney employed to collect a debt had no authority to compromise the debt on payment of a part thereof, nor to accept in satisfaction of such debt anything but money. (Lewis v. Gamage, 18 Mass., 346.)
In De Mets v. Dagron, 53 N. Y., 635, an attorney was authorized to collect the debt of his principal and execute a discharge of such debt. Instead of collecting the debt in money he took a promissory note of the debtor payable to his principal’s order in payment of a judgment in favor of his principal and against the debtor and released such judgment, and the court held that the attorney exceeded his authority, and the discharge of the judgment did not bind his principal.
In Miller v. Edmonston, 8 Blackf. [Ind.], 290, an attorney held three notes for collection belonging to his client signed by A and B. The attorney had no special instructions. He took a note from B for the amount of the three notes of A and B and surrendered the three notes to B, and then, at his request, B confessed a judgment in favor of the attorney’s client on the note given by him; and the court held that the attorney had exceeded his authority and that his conduct was not binding upon his client. The court said: “'When a demand is
Prom these authorities it is clear that if Bishop agreed that Ludden should be discharged from his debt to Cram in consideration of the note and mortgage executed by Sickel to Bishop the latter exceeded his authority and the agreement did not bind Cram; and if-Bishop agreed with Sickel to take the stock of goods in satisfaction of the debt due Cram, in so doing he exceeded his authority and the agreement was not binding upon Cram. But in the instruction first quoted above the court told the jury, in effect, that if Gram accepted and enforced the chattel mortgage given by Sickel to Bishop, this was a ratification of Bishop’s acts, although they were unauthorized. In view of the evidence this instruction should not have been given. In order that Cram should be held to a ratification of the unauthorized acts of Bishop in releasing Ludden and accepting the stock of goods in discharge of the debt he must have known, at the time that he approved of Bishop’s taking the mortgage and foreclosing it, the terms and conditions upon which Bishop acted. In other words, to estop Cram by ratification in approving of Bishop’s taking the mortgage and goods., Cram must have acted with a full knowledge of all the material facts upon which the transaction rested.
The undisputed evidence shows that if such agree: ments as were pleaded by Ludden and Sickel were ever made, they were not only made without authority of Cram, but made without his knowledge; and when he approved of Bishop’s conduct in taking the mortgage on the goods, and in selling the goods, he did so without
Counsel for the defendant in error, in support of their contention that the approval by Cram of Bishop’s conduct in taking the mortgage and in foreclosing it was of
We conclude, therefore, that Bishop>, in agreeing to release Ludden and accept the stock of goods in payment of the debt due Oram from Sickel and Ludden, exceeded his authority, and his principal is not bound by such agreement; that the finding of the jury that Oram had ratified the unauthorized acts of Bishop is wholly unsupported by the evidence. The judgment of the district court is reversed and the causé remanded.
Reversed and remanded.